The Bump in the Case
by SabreDae
Summary: SEQUEL TO THE WEDDING OF THE CENTURY Now married, Kate and Rick Castle have to navigate the ups and downs of their new life, how they fit in at the precinct and what their relationship means for the future. Cases, family, everything changes when they hit the big bump.
1. Chapter 1

**A/N: So, sequel! I'm just going to shut up and let you read. Though one quick thing…**

**DISCLAIMER: In no way do I claim ownership of recognisable characters. They all belong in the (somewhat) safe hands of Andrew Marlowe and Co. and ABC. **

* * *

_Previously…_

* * *

"_What have we got?"_

"_Two victims in the penthouse apartment, one James Cleaver and his wife, Monica. One of the neighbours from the floor below called 911 after hearing shots fired. When uniforms got here, they found the two bodies but the perp had gone. While they were searching the apartment, they heard crying coming from one of the cupboards and found the Cleavers' four year old daughter hiding in there, the room locked from the outside."_

"_Their kid was there the whole time?" Kate asked, astonished and almost sick to her stomach at the thought of an innocent, defenceless four year old girl hearing her parents being murdered._

"_Yeah," Esposito answered. "And there's something else…"_

* * *

Ryan and Esposito shared a grim look before the latino detective said, "While looking into the girl's family to find someone to take her, we found out she was adopted."

Kate nodded, silently wondering why the boys were looking steadily at her with worry in their eyes.

"Her biological mother is, well, it's Rachel Winters, Beckett."

She'd been dealt a physical blow, one that had her mind reeling. "What?"

"She's Rachel's daughter, that's why Gates wants you in on this. We're thinking that this is too coincidental to be, well a coincidence," Ryan explained softly, scrutinising Kate's face. They didn't want this to be another case that dragged her down the rabbit hole. Before they could stop her, she was rushing up the stairs, not bothering to hang around for the elevator.

Out of breath, she burst into the room, forgetting all about her normal survey of the crime scene, and gasped, "Lanie, tell me."

"This is just preliminary of course, but the size of the wounds on both bodies suggest maybe a .45. The wound here," Lanie indicated a bloody circle on the front of Monica Cleaver's shirt, to the left of her heart, with the end of her pen before continuing, "probably would have been fatal. She'd have bled out in minutes. Unfortunately, Mr Cleaver here on the other hand, suffered multiple shots before this one here probably punctured his lungs and caused him to drown in his own blood."

Kate was drawn out of her gloomy thoughts by a quiet whimper and a snivel coming from another room in the penthouse apartment. Leaving Lanie with the bodies, she headed into the other room, filled with growing unease as the sobs got louder.

"What's going on? Why's she still here?" Kate demanded of the uniform sitting with the Cleaver's little girl the second she caught sight of her.

The young uniform looked up as Kate crossed the room and crouched in front of the little girl. "Detective, my sergeant tasked me with keeping her here-"

"-This is a crime scene and you know as well as I do what's on the other side of that door and how upsetting this must be for her." Even if the girl hadn't been crying it was obvious she had experienced something traumatic. She frowned at the man, wondering how callous he could be. The first thing the officers should have done when they found the girl was have her checked over by paramedics before whisking her out of there. Ignoring the young uniform, she tilted her head until she was looking straight into the girl's tearful eyes. "Hi, I'm Kate, can you tell me your name?"

It took a few snuffles and attempts before Kate finally caught her whisper.

"Madeline, I'm a detective with the city police force. I'm really sorry but you can't stay here. Do you understand?" After a single nod from her, Kate yelled out for the Medical Examiner, requesting as soon as Lanie poked her head around the doorframe that she cover the bodies to avoid any further upset for Madeline when Kate was escorting her out. Whilst Lanie roped in some of CSU to help her drape sheets over the bodies of Madeline's parents, Kate tried to made idle talk with the girl. "How old are you, Madeline?"

"Four," she mumbled, not quite meeting Kate's eyes, instead looking past her at the stars and moon pattern on the carpet of her bedroom.

* * *

He strode out of the elevator, his eyes immediately looking for Kate's sun-bleached hair and the blue coat she'd had in her hand luggage in amongst the many desks of the bullpen. Without really thinking, Castle headed towards Esposito and Ryan when he saw them standing outside the breakroom.

"Hey guys."

"Castle," they said together, both nodding in perfect synchronicity. Sometimes Rick marvelled at how coordinated their movements were and chuckled at the mental picture he had of them competing in the Olympics in the synchronised diving events. Those tiny speedos just weren't Javi's thing.

"What are you doing here?" Ryan asked, his eyes flicking to look through the breakroom window before returning to Castle as he finally stopped in front of them.

"Kate texted," he answered with a shrug. "Where is she by the way?" He glanced around the bullpen again, wondering if he'd somehow missed her, before craning his neck to see between the two detectives. His heart stopped when he caught sight of her, sitting on the floor with one of the cutest children he'd seen since Alexis was first in his arms. Giving the boys a curious looks before his wife and the young girl claimed his gaze again, he murmured, "What's going on?"

"Beckett-sorry Castle's, keeping our little friend there entertained until a social worker comes to collect her since she's got no other family members to take her

He was mesmerised watching her interact with Madeline, so consumed by the image that he barely heard Esposito giving him the facts of the case. They were colouring, he noticed, though what Kate had drawn he couldn't tell from the angle he was stood at, since she was sat sideways. The four year old girl though had obviously drawn a picture of her family.

He couldn't help imagining a little girl just like her with a headful of brown curls and hazel eyes coming into his office in her mother's arms to present him with a drawing just like it, showing him, Kate, Alexis, her Gram and Pop and a big dog, something that could join all the other pictures he would have pinned up to decorate his office. No more spiralling staircases or lions would be needed.

With the blinds of the room pulled up, his view of Kate chatting away to the silent girl was uninterrupted, but he could only see her mouth moving; he couldn't hear the words she's saying. Without really knowing what he was doing, his hand reached out for the door handle, twisting it open.

Kate looked up at the noise, smiling gently at the sight of him hovering in the doorway. "Hey, Castle. Maddie, this is my husband, Rick."

"Maddie? That's funny, Kate has a friend called Maddie and she's got blonde hair just like you. Did she tell you?" Rick asked, coming into the room and closing the door behind him as Maddie nodded shyly. He perched on the edge of a chair where he could see Kate's sketch of an elephant and Maddie's picture of her family.

He was mostly silent, content to watch and listen to Kate interacting with Madeline. He was amazed by how good she was with her. Although Maddie was obviously retreating into herself, hardly talking, somehow Kate was able to continue to draw answers out of her. She was going to be a wonderful mother one day. Rick had known that for a long time, now he just wished it would be one day soon.

* * *

"Beckett," Espo said, popping his head through around the break room door. "The social worker's here."

"Thanks," Kate replied as she got to her feet before looking back down at Madeline. "Maddie, I'm just going to be out there for a few minutes," she told her, pointing out the break room window, "but Rick's gonna sit with you. Is that okay?"

Maddie looked at Rick without saying anything.

"He's really nice, I promise. He can help you draw – he's really good at dog ears."

Finally Maddie nodded and Kate left her alone with Castle.

"So, you need help with those dog ears then, huh?" he asked, doing his best to keep things light and as un-awkward as possible. He slid off the couch and peered critically at the drawing Maddie was in the process of finishing. "Is this a German Shepherd?"

Maddie nodded, and he breathed a silent sigh of relief at guessing right.

"That's good. German Shepherds are police dogs, you know. I see a lot of German Shepherds some days, so I'm extra good at drawing them." He picked up the brown crayon that Maddie had left on the floor. "May I?"

She nodded and watched noiselessly as he lightly drew the general shape of the ears before colouring them in with the brown and black crayons.

"Does this dog have a name?"

"Gizmo," Maddie answered quietly. She wasn't yet comfortable around him, but that was okay; he'd keep persevering.

"Gizmo, that's a good name. Reminds me of my favourite name – Cosmo."

Maddie giggled.

"What? You don't like the name?"

Again, she laughed. "It's funny."

Castle grinned, glad that he was finally connecting with the girl as Kate seemed to already have done. He was still smiling when the door to the break room opened again and Beckett leaned in to summon him out.

He watched from outside as Beckett introduced Madeline to the social worker and went on to explain that she was going to take her to some people who would look after her. He could see that in such a short time, Maddie had already formed a bond with Kate and didn't want to leave the precinct. It was understandable – after all, it had only taken one day of working with Kate (albeit unwillingly on her part) for him to find himself repeatedly drawn back to her.

Inside the breakroom, Kate could feel Castle watching her as Maddie tugged on her heartstrings with that crumpled expression. She knew she shouldn't but it was just one small hug before the girl left. She didn't think she'd be seeing the sweet girl again; she'd already managed to sneakily interview Maddie when they were just chatting and it was obvious that her parents had known of the threat hanging over them and had hurried to protect her, locking her in her own bedroom before she could be killed meaning she therefore hadn't seen their murderer.

* * *

Once the social worker and Madeline were gone, they sat side by side on Kate's desk and stared at the murder board that Esposito and Ryan had created whilst they were entertaining Maddie. Beside it stood a second white board containing all the details of Rachel Winters' murder since there was a strong possibility the two cases were linked.

"So, what leads do we have so far?" Kate asked, looking to Ryan and Esposito to fill her in on their work.

"Lanie should be finished with the autopsy in a couple of hours so we'll know for sure what size the slugs were and we'll be able to check ballistics for links to previous cases." Kate nodded as she digested the information.

"Have we got any more witness statements to chase up?"

Ryan shook his head. "Uniforms have already collected all the statements from the apartment staff and residents, but so far the only solid evidence we have is corroboration of the shots fired at 3:05. Other than that nobody saw or heard anything. We've requisitioned the buildings security tapes to check the entrances and elevator; they should be here any minute."

"And what about Rachel's case?" Castle asked. "Are we reopening it?"

"That would be my decision, Mr Castle," Gates announced, surprising both Kate and Rick since they had been sitting with their backs to her office and were unaware that she'd been listening to her detectives' report.

"So? Are we reopening it?" he asked again, desperate for the second opportunity to bring Rachel's killer to justice. Kate squeezed his wrist but kept her eyes locked on Captain Gates.

"Although we have two different murder weapons here, the presence of an undeniable link between the Cleavers and Miss Winters means we have to consider the possibility that the Cleavers adoption of Madeline led to their deaths and that we are dealing with the same killer. In light of this new information, I believe we have new avenues of investigation in the Winters case so, yes Mr Castle, the NYPD is officially reopening our investigation of Rachel Winters' murder."

"And – just to clarify – we're allowed to investigate it this time?"

Kate thought she caught a hint of amusement in Gate's eyes as Castle indicated her and himself with a hand flying between them. She very much hoped that that meant their captain would say yes.

"Two cases, four detectives. I'd say this case could do with a new set of eyes looking over the information, wouldn't you?"

Kate slid off the desk. "Thank you, Sir, you won't regret it."

* * *

He was still marvelling that they were getting the chance to investigate as he sat beside her in his chair once more.

"I just genuinely can't believe she said yes."

"Castle, you've said that five times in the last three minutes," Kate muttered without looking up from the file Esposito had handed her. It contained everything they had on Rachel's murder – statements from her assistant Henry, friend Violet and the cleaner who found her body, grainy CCTV freezeframes from street cameras outside taken around the time of her murder, the ME report. It was all there.

"Sorry. I'm just glad we get to finally solve this case, you know."

She nodded. She did know. Not being able to solve Rachel's murder, to even investigate, felt like an insult to Rachel's memory. It undermined her reasoning for even becoming a cop: to bring justice and closure to the families left behind. Briefly, she wondered what had happened when Ryan and Esposito had had to inform Rachel's father of her death – whether he'd been having a brief moment of clarity or if he'd been stuck without knowing he even had a daughter.

Both she and Castle were beginning to feel the effects of jet lag, yawning widely into their hands or shoulders, but she soldiered on, doing her best to get through the report while Ryan and Esposito sifted through hours of surveillance footage from the Cleavers' place.

When her eyes began to blur and stop recognising the words on the pages before her though, she gave in, placing all the documents back into the manila folder and sealing it shut before turning to Castle to find him snoring gently in the chair, his head propped up on his closed fist as he leaned against the table. She smirked at his open mouth and the way his hand moved the skin over his cheekbones. Really, he was quite adorable while he slept. It was when he was awake that he drove her slowly insane. Though she'd become so used to that that it was actually one of the things that she had grown to love – his ability to make every moment of her life fun.

Sighing, she tucked the manila folder under one of her arms and used her free hand to smooth Rick's tousled hair away from his forehead.

"Come on, Rick, it's time to go home."

* * *

**A/N: I just want to take a quick minute to explain that I had the idea for this story before I even knew that there was going to be an episode called 'The Good, the Bad and the Baby' and although the idea may seem like it's going to be very similar to the episode, it will be quite different so please don't be put off by that. Aside from that, I would love to hear any thoughts you may have so be sure to leave a review. Anyways, thanks for reading!**


	2. Chapter 2

**A/N: I'm glad you guys enjoyed the first chapter, and so many of you are reading this sequel. Special thanks go to alwayscastle2, hfce, Moochiecat, jellybean96, htbuzz, TORONTOSUN and Malakiva for reviewing! I hope you all enjoy this chapter too.**

* * *

She was so exhausted she was practically falling asleep at her desk while she waited for Castle to get out of the men's room so they could return home. In the cab back to the loft, she genuinely drifted off and had to be shaken awake by Rick when they had pulled up outside their SoHo building. He fared little better though. After being coaxed out of sleep by Kate when he fell asleep in his chair, he had to admit he had dozed for a moment when he was stood at the urinal and every few minutes his eyes would drift closed in the cab. In the elevator, it was only the sound of the car travelling up the rails and the feeling of the floor vibrating under their feet that kept them both awake.

* * *

The sound of deep laughter coming from within the loft as he opened up the front door stunned them both and caused them to freeze in the entry. Frowning, Rick sidestepped the haphazardly positioned bags that Kate had literally thrown through the door before heading off with Lanie for coffee and a catchup and continued into his apartment.

"Stop, stop!" Alexis giggled desperately from within the living room, popping up red-faced while the obviously male laughter continued.

"Alexis?!"

"Dad, you're back!" she exclaimed, leaping off the couch and running around it to hug him.

He stood stockstill, his arms eventually folding around his daughter after a few seconds in a jerking movement, until a second head popped up from the couch, this one topped with dark, tangled hair and a beard, and scared him half to death.

"Hey, Mr C!"

"What's going on?"

"Dad," Alexis cautioned before making the necessary introductions. "This is Pi, I met him in Costa Rica."

"And he's here now because…" Rick trailed off, waiting for his daughter to explain the presence of her holiday fling in his loft. In the back of his mind he wondered how long he'd been staying. If the numerous articles of men's clothing strewn through the kitchen, living room and dining room were a sign, he had guess that Pi had been living in his home with Alexis since he left for his and Kate's honeymoon.

Alexis dragged him away, her fingers digging into his elbow to tow him into the kitchen, where Pi couldn't hear her mutter, "He surprised me, Dad. He's here on a research project."

"A research project," he parroted, unable to do much else in his tired state.

Alexis nodded. "He's counting New York's bee population to see whether urbanisation and pollution have had any effect in the last five years. And, you know, he didn't have anywhere to stay."

* * *

He was still processing the development as he stood at the kitchen counter after finishing dinner and washing their dishes, leaning heavily on his hands grip against the edge of the work surface. Kate was leaning against him, simultaneously trying to remain upright and comfort him with feather-light touches and mumbled words.

"I need ice cream," he said suddenly, pulling away from her to go to the freezer.

"Oh, sorry, Dad," came Alexis' voice from the living room. "Pi and I finished that last night."

"Great," he muttered sarcastically. "Cookies it is then." He pulled the Death Star cookie jar out of one of the cupboards and took out a stack of chocolate chip cookies, definitely far too many than he was hungry for. He took a great big bite out of the first, munching away as Kate silently regarded him.

"You know, I didn't have you pegged as an emotional eater," she joked, trying to lighten his mood.

The smile he gave her was half-hearted, not quite reaching his eyes, while his laugh was little more than a quick exhale of air through his nose. Still, he was grateful to her for trying at least.

"You wanna help me unpack?" she asked, thinking maybe the task might help him take his mind off the way Alexis was sat in Pi's lap, and how blindsided he was by the whole thing.

"Sure," he replied, despite knowing he was going to end up just sitting on the bed when he grew bored of lobbing their dirty laundry in the direction of the clothes bin and most often falling short of his intended target.

She grabbed the two rolling suitcases, leaving him to pick up both of their carry ons and the bag of collected mementoes. Practically everything in the two suitcases, except the toiletries bag and the luxurious soaps and body washes Castle had somehow managed to steal from their hotel without her noticing, went straight into a pile to be shoved into the washing machines. While she worked through their suitcases, he opened their hand luggage, placing his copy of _Live and Let Die _on his bedside table and her copy of _In a Hail of Bullets _on the table on her side of the bed. He left Kate's small make up bag on the bed, along with her iPod and camera, which he then took out into his study to attach to his laptop so he could start downloading their photos. He stored their passports back in his desk drawer for safekeeping, before retrieving his iPad so he could charge it. It surprised him how such a boring, menial task kept his mind occupied. It was only when he started on their bag of mementoes and came across Alexis' gifts that he sat on the bed, holding onto the beautiful necklace made of strung together Tahitian pearls with the sarong Kate had picked out for her laid out on the bed beside him. He sighed before setting them aside. He could still hear Alexis out in the living room with Pi and didn't really want to disturb that; her present could wait till the morning.

Kate could feel his eyes boring into her back as she sorted through the final pieces of clothes from their suitcases before piling all of them on top of the laundry basket. When she finally turned and looked back at him with her hands on her hips, he was still staring, sitting dejectedly on the foot of the bed.

"Come on," she said, beckoning him towards her. As soon as he was within reach, her fingers slid around his hand, palms melding together, so she could drag him into the bathroom to get ready for bed.

It was an early night for them, falling into bed just before nine o'clock, but the jet lag had hit them hard and in their eyes it was an achievement that they had managed to stay awake for so long.

"So, we finally get to investigate Rachel's murder," he murmured, nuzzling his nose against juncture of her shoulder and neck.

"Yeah, we're solving this one," she said with determination, "so we're up bright and early, Castle."

He nodded, nose brushing against her skin again. "Night."

She turned her head, neck muscles straining so she could meet his lips and mutter against them, "Night, Rick."

* * *

He jerked awake at the urgent trill of his alarm clock, more startled than when they had come face to face with a tiger because he'd been so deeply asleep and enjoying a particularly pleasant dream. Seeing Kate sat upright against the headboard staring down at him, obviously having woken up before the alarm sounded, he frowned as he realised that what he had seen in his dream had no possibility of occurring.

"What?" she asked, noticing the downturn of the left corner of his mouth.

"Nothing," he yawned, stretching out his body before pushing the duvet aside and moving his legs around so he was sat in the middle of the mattress, elbows resting on his bare knees as another yawn took over his body. Looking back at Kate, he asked what was probably the most unnecessary question of their entire relationship. "Coffee?"

He was already on his feet and halfway into the kitchen when she called out, "With extra vanilla please."

When he opened the fridge to take out the milk and saw the carton of orange juice on the shelf inside the door, he couldn't help remembering the smiling face of the adorable little girl with Beckett's eyes, the one who'd thanked him when he handed her a sippy cup filled with the citrus drink before pushing her one the swings, _their swings_. He started again when Kate exited the bedroom, hurrying to shut the fridge and make their coffees before the brewed ground beans got cold.

Alexis and Pi wandered out and joined them whilst they were still drinking their coffees, Kate briefly disappearing into the bedroom to retrieve the sarong and necklace and give them to Alexis.

"Kate picked out the sarong," Rick muttered, briefly glancing up from the solid glare he had affixed on his hands curled around his coffee cup to direct his gaze at his daughter. He had still yet to acknowledge her boyfriend's presence at the breakfast bar.

"It's great," Alexis promised. "I love it. Thanks, Kate."

Kate smiled, pleased that she'd chosen okay, but shrugged off the praise, simply saying, "No problem. I'm just glad you like it."

As soon as they were done, they had to leave though, rushing into the shower. That morning Kate spent longer than usual applying her makeup, trying to cover the dark circles under her eyes from waking up too early – too used to the early sunrises of Bora Bora. Unlike her husband, she didn't have the ability to sleep indefinitely. Somehow, she was still ready before him though.

She was just double checking she had everything when he walked out of the bedroom, buttoning his shirt cuffs.

"Got your gun?" he called out, not noticing a hidden bulge at her hip like there usually was.

She patted her sides, not even finding the empty holster attached to the waistband of her trousers. "Gun, gun, where did I leave my gun?" she muttered to herself, trying to think backwards through her routine that morning.

"Is it still in the safe?"

"No," she replied, though it was too late because he had already backtracked into his study and pulled open the safe he kept hidden behind the spiral staircase picture adorning the wall behind his desk. "I definitely took it out of the safe."

"Nope, it's not in here," he confirmed, shutting the safe again and recentering the frame over it.

Sighing, Kate checked through the plain black bag she usually slung over her shoulder and took to work, finding only the manila folder containing all the details of Rachel Winters' case that she'd finally finished reading earlier that morning whilst she waited for Castle to wake up, as well as her badge, cell phone, purse and latex gloves reserved for handling evidence at crime scenes.

"Can you check the bedroom for me in case I left it in there?" she requested. "I'm just going to have a quick look around out here."

Finally, after retrieving her gun and holster from under the duvet – a situation created by Rick making the bed up whilst she was in the shower – they were on their way down to the precinct, ready to get to work on solving Rachel's murder.

"I think we should call in Rachel's friends – Violet, Henry, anyone else she knew from college – and see if they knew anything about Madeline."

"Makes sense," Rick nodded. "I wonder when she had Madeline. Wait, hang on, that was a stupid question," he added, as he presumably did the math and worked out that Rachel must have had her four year old daughter while she was still at college. Kate repressed her smirk and refocused on navigating around New York City's outrageously bad cab drivers. "Why do you reckon she gave Madeline up for adoption then?"

Kate shrugged. It didn't feel right to her to guess at Rachel's motives. In any regard, they were surely going to find out. It could be that Madeline had been the missing piece from Esposito and Ryan's initial investigation.

* * *

She could tell he was lost in his own little world, probably captivated by a new idea for Nikki, while she was busy dialling new phone numbers every few minutes, trying to organise getting in Rachel Winters' closest friends and family for interviews.

Instead though, he was thinking again about his dream, and how adorable Kate had been when she'd started teaching the small girl the rules of baseball, progressing through to playing catch with her, the both of them wearing mitts though their little girl's dwarfed her hand.

"You've got to grip it like this," Kate had said, placing her daughter's fingers over the seams of the ball.

Just remembering it, how proud they'd both been when their daughter had tossed the ball harder, more smoothly, gave him a sappy grin.

"Castle," Kate repeated, staring at him with a frown.

He almost toppled out of his chair as Kate nudged his leg under the table with her booted foot. "Huh?"

She nodded towards the interview room. "The social worker's here, you coming?"

"Oh yeah," he replied, jumping it and quickly checking his pockets to make sure his phone was still there, lest Gina call him. She and Paula were still planning to pull him away for the second half of his book tour sometime over the next two weeks, whittling down the fine details through long distance conference calls, the results of which his ex-wife then passed onto him. Earlier that morning, he'd been told that the second half of his book tour had actually been extended; taking him further west, since there was such high demand for him. Both he and Kate were hot in the media still in the aftermath of their wedding. "I'm right behind you." He motioned for her to lead, and followed as she crossed the bullpen and entered Interrogation room 1, taking the seat nearest the door opposite the social worker who had taken Madeline to her new foster home just the day before.

"How's Maddie?" Kate asked as soon as he was seated beside her, surprising him since the reason Olivia Dawson had been called for interview was to find out about Rachel's reasons for giving up Madeline Cleaver for adoption.

"Madeline is fine," Olivia assured Kate. "I dropped her off with a reliable foster family we're very familiar with last night and I'll be checking in with her over the next few days to see how she's settling in."

Kate nodded, smiling a little more.

"That's good. Were you familiar with the Cleavers, Ms Dawson?"

"I was the social worker who organised their adoption of Madeline, yes."

"So you also dealt with Rachel Winters, the biological mother?"

Olivia nodded. "I'm not sure what that has to do with the Cleavers' murder though…"

"So you were aware that Rachel Winters was murdered earlier this year in June?" Kate asked, keeping her tone professional, just to be sure that it did not come across that she was insinuating anything. At the beginning of their investigation, they couldn't afford to make such accusations.

"You don't think this was the same person?" the social worker gasped.

"It's possible," Castle said, before receiving a sharp look from Kate as he disclosed details of their investigative route.

Dragging her gaze off Castle and back to the prim woman sitting across from her in a tightly fitting skirted suit, she began speaking again. "Ms Dawson, if you could just tell us everything you know concerning the circumstances of Rachel Winter's decision to give up her daughter for adoption, you'd really be helping the case."

Olivia Dawson nodded. "I was the social worker assigned to pick Madeline up from the hospital after Ms Winter's doctor got in contact when the biological mother decided she couldn't keep the baby."

"Do you know why Rachel Winters decided to give Maddie up for adoption?"

"I'm afraid not. All I know is that she had requested an adoption. I picked up Madeline and took her back to a temporary home, I can't remember which one, and then when the Cleavers' file was tossed onto my desk, I set Madeline up with them."

* * *

"Rick, maybe you should just go home. You're obviously distracted," Kate finally said after he confused two of their interviewees and given her the wrong messages again when she'd been away from her desk for just the smallest moment.

He sighed and scrubbed a hand down his face, conceding internally that he'd hadn't been entirely with it. That dream was just playing on his mind too much. Nodding, he replied, "Okay, I'll see you at home," and pressed a kiss to the top of her head as he stood up from his chair and grabbed his coat.

He took a short cab ride, still caught up imagining what the little girl of his dream might have looked like when she'd first been born, whether her eyes would have been blue before turning hazel, whether she'd have had a small tuft of light brown hair or a whole head of it or nothing at all. He grimaced as he pictured her tiny face with his nose. Whatever she looked like though, he knew she was still perfect.

Exiting the cab, paying the driver, entering his building; he did it all on autopilot. He didn't even stop to think about taking the mail from the locker registered to their apartment; he just did it. It was only when he entered the loft and saw Alexis lounging on the couch with Pi again that he was jarred out of his imagination.

"Don't you have classes?" he blurted, shutting the door quietly behind him.

"I've been given the week off to do all the reading for them," she replied, raising her voice because she had no intention of turning around.

"Well, shouldn't you be reading then?"

She shrugged. "I'll start tomorrow."

Forsaking the entrance, he stepped into the kitchen and dropped the small pile of post he'd yet to even start looking through onto the counter top, leaving his hands free to make a drink. Normally the scotch wouldn't come out until the evening, but he needed something strong and stiff if he was expected to tolerate the presence of Alexis' new boyfriend, who they'd learned after breakfast was a fruitarian and wouldn't let him anywhere near the rashers of bacon he'd intended on frying up to eat with pancakes. He just hoped that once Alexis moved back to the college dorms, he'd find someplace else to stay; or better yet, Alexis would move on from her holiday fling.

He placed the glass of scotch down on the counter after one large swig before turning to his mail and sifting out the junk to be thrown straight into the trash, coming to a stop shortly after beginning when he came across a large, thick brown envelope addressed to him and Kate.

He stopped and grinned, pulling out his phone to snap a picture of the front and send it to Kate.

_Mr and Mrs Castle! First piece of mail! _

As soon as the message had gone through he tore open the top of the envelope and pulled out a stack of printed photos, the first of which showed Kate having her hair and makeup done, while Alexis and Lanie looked on. She was beautiful. For the next three hours he lost himself in slowly flipping through the stack, studying every tiny detail. He didn't realise he'd been sat on one of the uncomfortable backless stools at the breakfast bar, or how much time had passed while he'd been completely absorbed until the front door opened and Kate walked through, dropping her bag on the sidetable along with her keys.

"Hey," she greeted, coming straight over to kiss him. "What have we got then?" He could hear the building excitement in her voice, pleased like him at their first piece of mail addressed to them as a married couple.

"The wedding photos," he answered with a grin, showing her the one that happened to be held by his fingertips at that very moment.

"You looked so handsome," she murmured, looking at the picture of him standing at the end of the aisle, watching her make her ascent towards him, over his shoulder.

"Ruggedly handsome, you mean?" he quipped with a smirk and a quirked eyebrow that earned him an elbow in the ribs.

He quietly flicked through a few more photos, the both of them silent until she suddenly said, "It was such a great day, wasn't it?"

"Well, I still think a space wedding would have been cooler-" he broke off as she raised a disbelieving eyebrow at him, quickly tacking onto the end, "but I'd say it was pretty perfect." He pressed his lips to her cheek quickly, hoping to pacify her before she slapped his arm. Really he wasn't lying. In his eyes, they had definitely had a wedding he would remember fondly for the rest of his life.

* * *

**A/N: Thanks for reading. Let me know what you thought.  
**

**And Happy Valentine's Day!**


	3. Chapter 3

**A/N: Thanks go to jellybean96, GeekMom, hfce, wendykw, TORONTOSUN, htbuzz, Moochiecat, alwayscastle2 and kramerjp for reviewing! I'm elated by the response to this story. I worried that it would feel a bit case heavy, so please if you do think that at any point, the case is taking over and you're not enjoying it or you want to see more Caskett scenes or any other kind of scenes, do tell me and I will take it into consideration. The previous chapter was quite Castle centric, so this one will focus in on Kate a bit more. I hope that you all enjoy it!**

* * *

It was a busy day from the get-go, with the first of Rachel's friends already waiting to be interviewed when she arrived at the precinct. After setting Esposito and Ryan to work on tracking down Marcus DeWitt, Madeline Cleaver's biological father, she led Debbie Ryan into the interview room. She'd spent so much time with him for the last few weeks while they were honeymooning, it felt unusual to not have Castle sat in the chair beside her. But he was out for the day, finalising the details of his extended book tour, getting ready to leave the following week.

She took time while sitting and shuffling the file around in front of her to organise her thoughts before beginning.

"I'm sorry to drag all this up again after these last few months. In light of some new information, we're reopening Rachel's case, and I have a few questions for you if that's okay, Debbie?"

"Sure," the quiet, unassuming woman sat opposite her replied. "Whatever I can do to help."

Beckett flashed Debbie a small, grateful smile. "I was wondering if you could tell me about the last time you saw or spoke to Rachel. I know it's hard, but anything you remember would be great."

Debbie nodded, silent while she thought back. "It was in June some time. We went away for a week together – all us old college girls we do it every year. I'm so busy with Med School at the moment that I rarely get to meet up."

"You went to Yale with Rachel?"

"Yeah," Debbie answered. "It was how we met, we had Psychology classes together."

Kate nodded. "How did she seem to you the last time you were together?"

"She was…okay, I guess," Debbie said slowly. "I mean, she was obviously upset about her dad, she'd only just moved him into the care home and found the decision hard."

"Was there anything else going on?"

"What do you mean?"

"Debbie, a few months back my partner and I spoke to another of Rachel's friends – Violet. Violet thought that someone might have been threatening Rachel-"

"What? That's crazy. Rachel wasn't into anything that would have- She didn't do stuff like drugs or deal with people that would-"

Kate nodded slowly, reaching an open palm out. "I'm not saying that Rachel was involved with anything dangerous, Debbie, but there are plenty of reasons that someone could have been blackmailing or threatening her. At the moment, this is all just speculation. It's entirely possible that Violet got the wrong end of the stick, which is why I'm asking you whether Rachel seemed stressed or distracted or…scared the last time you saw her. So?"

"I don't know," Debbie sighed. "She was stressed, sure, but she had just found out her father was ill. She didn't know what to do, and her boss was on her ass about another one of their high profile celebrity weddings. I honestly never thought there was anything else to it."

Kate nodded. She had hardly expected the first friend of Rachel's that she spoke to would crack her case wide open. "If you remember anything else, anything you think might be of help-" Kate began, sliding a card with her extension number on across the table.

"-Of course," Debbie interrupted.

As Kate showed Debbie out, the second of Rachel's friends she was going to interview entered the precinct, pausing as she and Debbie recognised each other and greeted one another with a consoling hug, sharing grief once more over their friend's untimely death. Before she could awkwardly break up the two, knowing the hands on her watch were already counting down the minutes until Jennifer Canley, her third appointment was meant to arrive, Debbie pulled away.

"I'm really sorry, Maggie, but I've got to get back before I miss my biochem class. We'll meet up soon, yeah?"

"Sure," Maggie Philips said easily, letting her friend leave.

As they walked up to the third floor together, Kate conversationally asked, "So, were you at Yale with Debbie and Rachel too?"

"Yeah, I only met them in my second year though. I was in Rachel's English classes while she was really struggling with the pregnancy-"

"-The girl she gave up for adoption?"

"Yeah. Some of the other people in the class, a few of the people whose parents probably pretty much bought them their places, were giving her a hard time. I told them to stuff their Victorian opinions," she answered with an easy shrug. It was obvious to Kate from these few simple sentences, that Maggie Philips was the ballsy one in Rachel's circle of friends. She hoped that that meant she would be candour in the interview.

"If you don't mind me asking, why didn't she keep the baby?" Kate asked, almost saying Maddie's name.

"Her father mostly. He really didn't approve of her relationship with Marcus to begin with, and when he found out that he'd knocked her up and wasn't going to even support her, well he kinda hit the ceiling. Told her to kick him out of her life and get rid of the baby too so she wouldn't be left with his 'jackass taint'."

Kate didn't know what to say to that. When she thought of how she first perceived Rachel, as a stuck-up, self-absorbed girl; she felt ashamed. Even when she realised that her first assumptions were wrong and that Rachel was in fact generous and helpful to a fault, patient and supportive, kind and thoughtful; Kate had had no idea of all the adversity she had graciously overcome, never once letting the trials of life change her.

They were just sitting down across from one another, Kate taking the same seat she'd been sat in barely five minutes previously when Maggie asked, "So what's this all about, Detective Beckett?"

"We've had some new investigative angles open up for Rachel's case-"

"The Cleavers' murders," Maggie nodded. "It was in the newspaper yesterday morning."

"You know that Madeline Cleaver is Rachel's biological daughter?"

"Oh, sure, Rachel talked to me when she first decided she wanted to visit her. It was never a closed adoption – Rachel didn't want to do that to the girl. I don't think she ever wanted to give her up in the first place, but her dad was, well he was pretty controlling, especially after Rachel's Mom had an affair and left them."

Kate kept the frown off of her face and instead sought clarification. "She's had contact with Madeline?"

"The Cleavers kept her updated with letters, but she never saw Madeline, no. She was just trying to arrange a first meeting with her about a week before…well, you know," Maggie said, breaking off awkwardly when she realised she still couldn't refer to Rachel as dead. Kate nodded sympathetically; she knew what that was like. For the first month after her mother's dead, she had unwittingly carried on talking about her in the present tense. "She was really looking forward to it, I think."

* * *

As soon as she had shown Maggie out and finished all of her other appointments with Rachel's friends, Kate ducked into the break room to grab a coffee. Over the years, and after using the espresso machine Castle had in their kitchen, she had finally got the knack for brewing an okay latte without having to resort to the precinct's monkey-pee-in-battery-acid machine. Once she had a mugful of frothy caffeine to perk her up, Kate strode out into the bullpen, making a beeline for Ryan and Esposito's desks.

"Anything turn up with the friends?" Javi asked, dropping a file onto his desk, and folding his hands behind his head instead as he pushed his chair onto its back legs and looked up at her.

"Yes, actually. Ryan, could you get onto Child Services for me and organise getting Olivia Dawson back here?"

Ryan nodded, already pulling his phone closer and beginning to dial.

"Why do you need the social worker again?"

"Apparently she forgot to mention that Rachel was seeking visitation with Maddie," she answered brusquely. "Where are we with Marcus DeWitt?"

"DMV registers him as living down on Kent Avenue but when we spoke with the super, guy said DeWitt hasn't been there in months. We're working on trying to track him through his job – the super said he used to work in a gallery somewhere in downtown Brooklyn, so we're working through the phone books."

"Keep me posted," Beckett requested, stopping by Gates' office to keep her up-to-date with the two cases she and the boys were working.

Gates nodded as soon as Kate had finished detailing the results of their work so far, sending her back out to start putting all of Rachel's information back onto the murder board.

Kate's stomach flip-flopped when she drew the headshot of Rachel Winters from the box her file had been shoved into, followed by the photo CSU had taken at her father's apartment. Pushing aside the nauseous feeling in the pit of her stomach, Kate pinned the two pictures underneath magnets before grabbing the black whiteboard marker and writing Rachel's name above them in neat, blocked letters.

Once the board was complete, holding all the information they had, including Violet's suggestion that she was being threatened and the possibility that Maddie was the motive behind this murder, those two uncertainties swiftly punctuated with question marks, Kate silently stood and took it all in, vowing that she would find justice for Rachel Winters.

Beside Rachel's picture, the photo the DMV had on file for Marcus DeWitt, and the comment that his listed height, 5'8", matched the description given by the doorman on Rachel's father's building.

At twelve on the dot her cell phone rang, Castle's face beaming up at her from the screen. A grin spread across her own face as she accepted the call.

"Hey, blueberry or chocolate chip?" he asked.

"I'm sorry?"

"Blueberry or chocolate chip?" he repeated, sounding kind of distracted. After a beat of silence, he elaborated, "Muffins. Do you want blueberry or chocolate chip? I finished my meeting early so I thought I'd bring you and the guys some lunch."

"In that case, blueberry," she answered, moving the phone from her mouth as she turned to call out to the boys, "Castle's bring lunch, what do you guys want?"

Relaying their orders down the phone, Kate smiled as he murmured a 'uh huh' at every item, sounding suspiciously like he was writing everything down so he wouldn't forget when he went up to the counter.

"Okay," he finally said when she'd finished. "I'll be as quick as I can."

"Sure, see you soon. Love you."

"Love you too," he sang into the phone before hanging up.

* * *

Depositing the paper bags containing all of the things he'd bought for lunch, Castle brushed his lips over Kate's as she stood to greet him.

He dug around in one of the bags before pulling out a plastic container and declaring, "Voila! One blueberry muffin for Mrs Castle."

She accepted it with a smile, putting it on the far side of her keyboard as she waited for Castle to pull out whatever else he'd bought her, a crispy chicken salad with croutons and a small vial of dressing.

While they were eating, Captain Gates stuck her head out of her office door and called, "Detective Beckett? Where are we with tracking down Marcus DeWitt?"

"We're halfway through the city's galleries," Kate answered, setting down her salad and wiping her hands in case Gates wanted anything else.

But the captain just returned to her desk, leaving the door open so she could keep her attention somewhat focused on the events of the bullpen. The next thing Kate knew, Rick was pouting at her. "You're not taking my name-"

Kate squirmed. They still hadn't really had time to discuss this. Officially, she was now Katherine Houghton Castle, but she hadn't had any time to talk about whether she would keep her maiden name for her police work with him. She'd barely thought about it herself. It was more a case of convenience and habit that had her responding to the name, the others calling her it.

"It's just for the precinct and the cases, Castle," she promised. "Everywhere else, I'm a Castle."

He nodded, putting on a brave face as he told her that he should have expected it.

* * *

"So this book tour? When are you leaving?" she asked, dropping their rubbish into the breakroom bin while he leaned back against one of the counters, unashamedly looking at her butt as she bent over to retrieve a muffin case that had dropped onto the floor.

"End of the week," he sighed. His arms reached for her as soon as she'd got all the rubbish in the bin, pulling her around until she was standing toe to toe with him. His arms hung around her waist, hands linked and taut at her back as she leaned backwards to really look at him.

"How long are you going to be gone for?"

"A month," he said regretfully, rubbing one of his palms against her back through the smooth material of her blue shirt.

Kate sighed too, all while reminding herself that she was going to have to get used to these periods. Her job was getting up and working at all hours of the night and the day. His was travelling all over the country to promote his books. A month just felt too long was all.

Reading her like she read one of his books, he murmured hopefully, "You could always come with me."

"Next time maybe," she replied, knowing she couldn't just up and leave when she was in the middle of a case, especially as she'd only just started working again after her vacation time. Lifting her arms and looping them around his neck, she pushed the fingers of one hand into the hair at the nape of his neck. "We can talk every day, Facetime, Skype."

He nodded, trying for a smile and succeeding in curling the corners of his lips for her. "I'll be back before you know it," he promised, leaning towards her to press his lips against hers.

"Yo, Beckett!" Esposito called, interrupting the moment and pulling a growl from Castle. "Got something!" He was just finishing jotting something down on his pad, phone still cradled between his shoulder and ear despite the fact that the line had already gone dead, when she reluctantly disentangled herself from Castle's arms and left the privacy of the breakroom. "He's working at Pho Tillery Studio – his shift will be starting in fifteen minutes."

"Let's go," she replied, leading the boys and Castle to the elevator.

* * *

Forty minutes later, Marcus DeWitt was sat across from Beckett and Esposito, resolutely not saying anything.

"You don't want to talk?" Kate waited, leaving him one last opportunity to answer her questions before she continued, "Fine. Maybe a night in one of our cells will loosen your tongue."

* * *

**A/N: I uploaded this today rather than tomorrow because I'm going to be pretty busy with dissertation meetings, travelling home and seeing my mum in a play and stuff so I wasn't sure if I would have enough time to update this story or not. Guess that's good for you guys though, because you get something to read a day earlier. Anyway, do let me know what you think. Too case heavy? Am I writing the case okay? Also, please feel free to point out mistakes I make in any of my chapters, be they with my grammar, my spelling (though remember that I'm English so the majority of the time I use British spelling, not American) or parts of the plot where I should have researched procedure and locations better. **


	4. Chapter 4

**A/N: Thank you everyone who has been reviewing! I love reading what you all think. It makes writing a story so much more worthwhile and fun. So thank yous taken care of, I'll just shut up and let you all read on. **

* * *

Kate and Rick watched from behind the twoway mirror as Marcus DeWitt was led back into their interrogation room after spending a night in lockup. If his clenched jaw was anything to go by, he wasn't happy about that. Once he was sat down, Kate turned to her husband.

"Come on." She led the way out of the observation room and through the next door to the right, calmly walking into the interrogation room and sitting herself down without so much as a glance at their suspect. Once Castle had shut the door and sat down; following her lead and relaxing his posture with his arms resting on the table top as he made eye contact with Marcus, watching him while Kate unnerved him, she began. "We took a blood sample from you yesterday, Marcus, do you remember? We've got your fingerprints too. Any minute now, the results of that blood test will be back. You've got one last chance to explain before we have undeniable evidence that you were in Rachel Winter's apartment."

There was a choked sound in the back of Marcus' throat before he desperately declared, "Fine, I was there, okay! But I _swear _I didn't kill her. She was already dead, I swear." Neither Rick nor Kate missed the pleading tone of his voice, but it would take a lot more than that to convince Kate that he was innocent.

"So why didn't you report it?"

"Because I knew y'all would think I'd done it! I'm not stupid; I know it doesn't look good with my record."

"You have a history of violent crime, Mr DeWitt. Three counts of assault and a robbery charge-"

"-I was a kid! I don't do that stuff anymore."

"So where were you July 27th?" she questioned.

"I was working on my artwork-"

"-Your artwork?" Castle asked, frowning. Marcus DeWitt's employment record didn't reflect anything other than secretary work in a few of Ney York's galleries.

"Yeah, I've been...submitting some of my old sketches and paintings to a few galleries around the city. Some of my stuff was bought, so I started getting more serious about it." He shrugged before continuing. "I've spent most of my time at my apartment, completely immersed."

"Is there anyone who can verify that you were there on the night of Rachel's murder?"

"My next door neighbour came up around ten that night, I think," Marcus replied after a few moments thought.

"We'll be checking," Kate assured Marcus, before getting up and leaving.

The second the door closed, Castle asked, "So? Do you think it was him?"

"He doesn't seem to have a motive. But we can check with his neighbours to corroborate his alibi."

He nodded, following her example as she picked up her coat from the back of her chair and slipped it on, pulling her hair out from underneath the collar. His own coat was held over his arm until they exited the elevator on the ground floor of the precinct and stepped out onto the street. As rush of wind passed by, lifting leaves and litter alike into the air, he shivered and pulled the wool coat on over the top of his blazer. Pretty soon he would have to start wearing his scarf again.

He warmed his hands over the air conditioning vents as Kate drove, her own hands protected from the chill in the wintery air by leather gloves.

* * *

"Guess he was serious about his art excuse," Rick commented as they paused in the doorway. Directly across from them was an impossibly large canvas that blotted out all light from the window behind it. It was so dim with the restriction of natural light that Kate actually flipped the light switch beside the door to help illuminate the room. "You don't think he's conflicted do you?"

Kate rolled her eyes, ignoring her husband's sarcasm as he surveyed the painting filled with angry black, brush strokes and soft, faded watercolours, and instead focused on taking a quick search of Marcus DeWitt's apartment, sifting through a few scraps of paper – most of them covered in rough, pencil-drawn sketches – in case there was anything related to Rachel Winters in the open space multi-functioning room.

"You wanna search while I go check his story with the neighbour?"

Rick nodded absent-mindedly, busy staring at the various canvas artworks adorning the walls. Muttering to himself, he said, "There must be something against that many hangings in his contract."

Her knuckles rapped a quick rhythm on the door across the hall, her toes tapped while she waited for some sounds of life from within. "NYPD," she called after a few silent moments, her badge already in her hand ready to be displayed. Finally, with after the creaking of a few springs and some plodding, heavy footfalls, the door was flung open and a round-bellied man stared out at her.

"Yeah?"

"Marcus DeWitt, across the hall," she began, pointing back over her shoulder at the unlocked apartment she'd just left. "Did you see him at all on July 27th?"

"Er…"

The silence between them while her suspect's neighbour thought back filled with the sound of the audience laughter of some daytime comedy. Kate waited anxiously. If Marcus was caught lying, the case would probably be much easier to solve.

"July 27th, that was a Thursday, right?"

Kate nodded an affirmative, trying to keep her patience.

"Well, he usually works till late Thursday evenings so I probably would have taken his mail in for him that day. He gets a delivery of art supplies, new brushes and paints, stuff like that every week," the guy explained slowly. "Yeah, I think I saw him that evening when he got back home."

"You're sure?"

"Yeah, had to help him manhandle that beast of canvas through the door. Should have seen the delivery guy's face when he unloaded that," the man from 6B chuckled.

"Right, sorry to have taken your time. Thanks for your help, Mr…"

"Avery. Charles Avery."

Kate nodded and shook his hand before returning to Castle. "Well? Find anything?"

"Huh?" he asked, blinking as he finally turned away from the seven feet long canvas.

"Have you honestly been staring at that the entire time?"

"It's good work," he defending as soon as her annoyed, impatient tone hit his ears.

* * *

"Well Marcus," Kate said as she shut the interrogation room door behind her, "you're in luck. Your neighbour confirmed your alibi."

She watched the tension in Marcus DeWitt ease, his whole body seeming to deflate on a sigh before he replied, "I told you I didn't do it. So can I go now?"

"Unfortunately, I still have a few questions for you."

"Questions about what? You already know I had nothing to do with Rachel's death-"

"That might be true, but that doesn't mean you didn't have anything to do with the murders of James and Monica Cleaver. So did you know them?" Kate asked, staring intently at the bearded, curly-haired man sat opposite her, ready to catch any miniscule changes in his facial expression or his body language.

He frowned and shook his head, not trying to hide his confusion in the slightest. "I have no idea who you're talking about. What's this about, Detective Beckett?"

"It's about your daughter, Marcus," she said, leaning back in her chair and folding her arms.

"My daughter? I don't have a daughter-"

"Don't lie, Marcus. You're listed as Madeline Cleaver's biological father on her birth certificate. She is the child you had with Rachel Winters, isn't she?"

On the other side of the two way mirror, Castle watched with a sinking heart and disgusted expression as Marcus continued to claim that although, yes, Maddie was technically his biological daughter, he had never had – nor wanted – anything to do with her. How anyone could not want to have that little girl, or indeed any child, in their life was beyond him.

"I told her she should have aborted it-" That was it for Rick. He couldn't stand to listen to any more. Alexis was one of the best parts of his life, a part that he could never bring himself to regret – even if he knew in his heart that had Meredith not fallen pregnant with their daughter, they would likely have never stayed together long enough to get married.

He was waiting patiently by Kate's desk when she returned.

"Apparently, Rachel had arranged a meeting for that Friday with Marcus, said she had something important to discuss with him though she neglected to tell him what that was, so we're still in the dark about her reasons." Sighing, Kate threw herself into her chair and nudged her computer mouse to bring the machine off the NYPD screensaver, finding that she had an email from Lanie. Wondering why her best friend would have emailed rather than called or texted, she dug her phone out from her coat, her arm twisting at an awkward angle so she could reach it rather than stand up and lift her coat off the back of the chair, and found that she had a couple of missed calls from the Medical Examiner. She scanned the email, before spinning on her chair so she was facing Ryan and Esposito, the two detectives now working through the Cleavers' recent phone records for anything suspicious. "Ryan, have you heard anything about Olivia Dawson?"

"Child Protective Services said she was tangled up with a troublesome foster kid but would stop by as soon as she could," he said.

Kate nodded. "I'm heading to the morgue, Lanie's got something. If she turns up while I'm gone, let me know?"

"You got it," Kevin promised.

"Come on, Castle," Kate said as soon as she'd grabbed her keys, coat and phone.

He followed her quietly, and it was only in the car as she drove over to the Office of the Chief Medical Examiner that she realised he hadn't said a word since the interrogation. She glanced at him, flicking her eyes in his direction before looking back at the road then at him and then at the road again. "Hey, you okay? Rick?"

He was slow to reply. "I heard DeWitt saying that he didn't want anything to do with Maddie. I just don't understand why."

Kate's heart wrenched. Of course he didn't understand why someone would not want their child. He had a child that he loved more than anything. Even if he wasn't a father, he would still be the most loving, generous man. He was just so warm. But he was one of those rare people. Kate Beckett, she'd spent half her life encountering humanity's lowest of the low. She knew how horrid and careless and unfeeling people could really be.

"Castle…" she trailed off when she realised that she didn't know what to say to comfort him. "Sometimes people are just… Maybe Marcus would feel differently, you know, if he met Maddie. You can't really know how you feel about being a parent until you've experienced it, right?"

* * *

She didn't think she'd done a very good job at consoling him. Rick was still pretty quiet while they meandered through the corridors of OCME till they reached the autopsy room that Lanie was operating in.

Their close friend looked up from the notes she was making on a clipboard when they entered, and smiled briefly.

"You have something?"

Lanie nodded. "I did James Cleaver's autopsy yesterday, and didn't think anything of it at first, but then I had to re-evaluate that when I looked at Monica today and found the same mark." Still talking, Lanie led them over to the first of the bodies, James', and pointed towards his inner elbow, where there was quite obviously a small puncture mark that was mirrored on his wife's arm.

"Lanie," Castle asked, seeming to have perked up somewhat now that he had something else to draw his attention, "are these needle marks?"

"Yes, though they're from a few days ago. I looked up their medical records to see if it was for some kind of treatment or a routine blood donation or not and found that they both submitted blood tests to check whether they would be compatible donors for their daughter-"

"Madeline Cleaver's ill?"

Lanie answered Kate's question with a nod. "I checked her records too, Sweetie. She's been diagnosed with type 3 Gaucher's Disease."

"Which is?"

"It's a disease that affects the metabolism and allows glucocerebroside to build up in the body. Judging from Madeline's medical notes, the builds have caused severe damage to her liver."

"Lanie, can you check Rachel Winter's autopsy notes, see if she had any needle marks too?"

"Sure," Lanie answered, crossing the room to her computer and doing a quick search to bring up the appropriate file. After reading through, she turned back to Kate and Rick. "There was a needle mark, but as Toxicology didn't bring up anything, we didn't rule it as relevant to the murder. Like I said earlier, if James and Monica hadn't both had these, we probably wouldn't even be talking about this."

"Maybe this is what Rachel wanted to talk to Marcus about. Ask him to get tested for compatibility," Kate said to Rick, who nodded thoughtfully.

"Makes sense. Lanie, do you know if Rachel or the Cleavers were compatible?"

"The results haven't come through for the Cleavers yet. The tests were very recent. I'd imagine that since Rachel is the biological mother, she was the first port of call and the Cleavers only had themselves tested from desperation."

* * *

"She seemed so healthy," Rick muttered in the car. Kate glanced at his crumpled face as he whispered, "She's so young."

"Maybe that's a good thing – they've diagnosed it early so she'll better chances of finding a suitable donor." She cut the engine in the precinct garage, leaving the keys dangling from the ignition while she reached for Castle's hand and squeezed his fingers. "She'll be okay."

He nodded, but it was hard to feel cheerful. Maddie was four, she was supposed to be running around the school playground with girls and boys, skinning her knees when she tripped; not having blood transfusions and operations.

She gave his hand one last squeeze before removing her keys and opening her Dodge's door, stepping out into the garage. Castle's door slammed, the sound echoing through the lofty spaces of the concrete basement followed by the electronic click as she locked the doors. His large hand was wrapped tightly around hers in the elevator, the two of them standing so close together that their sides were brushing and his arm was forced in front of her body, their joined hands resting against her thigh. Despite their rule about PDAs and professionalism in the precinct, Kate kept their hands together, palms kissing, while they traversed the short distance to the bullpen, stopping as Ryan appeared out of the breakroom and nodded towards the interview room.

"I set Olivia Dawson up for you. She just got here."

"Okay," she nodded. "Thanks, Kev." As soon as he had returned to the breakroom and she was alone with Castle again – well as isolated and secluded as was possible in the middle of the precinct – she asked, "Are you coming in?"

He paused, opening and closing his mouth once before replying, "Actually, I think I might sit this one out. Hang with the boys for a bit, maybe."

She nodded. She'd kind of been expecting it really. It wasn't that she wasn't as affected as he was by the news of Maddie's illness; she was. She just knew she had to keep focused on her job. Giving him a swift hug, she pressed her lips over his in the briefest kiss before turning and dropping her coat and things back by her desk.

When she entered the interview room, Olivia Dawson was on her feet, pacing the length of the room.

"I've only got an hour before I need to get back to work so this better be quick, Detective," she bristled.

"I'll try not to keep you," Kate replied, her lack of energy preventing a retort. "I've only called you back because you withheld information in our first meeting-"

"I did no such thing!"

"Why didn't you tell us that Rachel Winters had an open adoption then, that she was organising visitation with Maddie?"

"The fact that the Madeline's case was an open adoption was neither here nor there. And as for Ms Winters visiting the Cleavers, Madeline's parents had always had a good relationship with Ms Winters. Although we were involved in the beginning, acting as liaisons for the biological mother and adoptive parents, there came a point where our assistance was no longer required. Unless the Cleavers were unhappy with Ms Winter's requests for visitation, they had no reason to get in contact with us." Kate studied her silently, watching as Olivia grew nervous and sat down, fidgeting with her fingers under Kate's intense scrutiny. Finally she sighed, quite clearly much calmer than when Kate had first walked into the room. "I swear I did not intentionally withhold information. If Rachel Winters was arranging a visit with Madeline Cleaver, Child Services had no knowledge of it."

Kate nodded. "We've recently found evidence that James and Monica Cleaver were looking into medical treatment for Madeline. I'm not sure whether you're aware that she's been diagnosed with Gaucher's Disease." Olivia gasped, but she continued speaking. "But she'll need-"

"I'll arrange an appointment at the hospital," the social worker said, nodding reassuringly.

* * *

After showing Olivia Dawson out of the precinct, Kate returned to the bull pen to see both Ryan and Esposito at their desks with Castle nowhere to be found. Shrugging to herself, she popped her head around the open breakroom door before conceding defeat and asking his whereabouts of her fellow detectives.

"Did you guys see where Castle went?"

Espo looked up, glancing towards the breakroom with a furrowed brow. "He was just…" Breaking off, he turned to Ryan. "Did you see him go?"

"No, maybe he just went to the bathroom – you want me to go check?"

"Thanks," Kate nodded, fishing her phone out of her coat pocket. It worried her a bit that there was no explanatory text message from him, nor a missed call; so whilst Ryan was searching the men's toilets, she quickly selected her husband's number from her cell phone contacts and gave him a ring.

He answered after a few seconds of ringing with his usual, "Hey, babe." He sounded a lot cheerier than when she'd last seen him, but she knew better than anyone how much of his mother's theatrical ability Rick had inherited.

"Where are you?"

"Oh shoot, I forgot to leave a post-it on your desk. Sorry. Gina sent a book she wanted me to read and give a review for while we were in Bora Bora and apparently time is of the essence – they need a quote like yesterday, so I came back to the loft to grab the book and get reading." She nodded, mouthing an apology at Ryan as he returned and shook his head at her. "What do you want for dinner – I can cook it so it's ready for when you get home."

"Haven't we got leftovers to eat up?"

"Probably," he said and just from the tone of his voice she knew he was shrugging. "But they're in the freezer so it's not like they're urgent. I can do Italian, or something."

"I honestly don't mind-"

"-I think," he paused, the slight strain of his voice telling her that he was stretching for something. "Yeah, we've still got some of that wine you like-"

Glancing surreptitiously over her shoulder at the boys, and yet still shielding her mouth and the phone with one of her hands, she interrupted, "-The one that makes me-"

"-Incredibly horny. Yep, that's the one. It's good with lasagne."

"Castle, you're not trying to-"

"-What treat my wife to a lovely evening of sumptuous food and delectable wine?" he asked, feigning offence at the suggestion that he was trying to lure her into bed with him – not that it took a lot.

She chuckled. "Whatever. It sounds great anyway. I'll be home soon."

"Okay, bye."

"See you later, babe," she responded, studiously ignoring the looks Javi and Kevin were shooting her. So what if she used the word 'babe' – it wasn't a crime.

* * *

Stuffed, she pushed her plate away from her and leaned back in the chair, surveying Rick with careful attention. Although he'd greeted her at the door with a tomato-sauce covered wooden spoon in one hand and a book in the other, seeming happy enough as he pressed a kiss to her lips, there something very careful about his expressions, something that suggested he was trying too hard to keep smiling.

"You okay?"

He nodded, playing with his fork instead of making eye contact.

"Rick, whatever it is just tell me," she requested, reaching out for his hand, running the pad of her thumb over his closed fist.

Sighing, he set his fork down and looked up. "I just can't stop thinking about Maddie and how awful it is that Marcus doesn't want anything to do with her. Her parents have just died, her mom's gone and now her dad doesn't even want to know her. I mean, who wouldn't want her in their life?" Before she could formulate a reply, he was speaking again. "And as if that's not enough, she's ill too."

"Maddie will be fine. Lanie has a sample of Marcus' blood. She's not supposed to, but she said she'd run a check to see if he's a compatible match for Maddie." It wasn't an easy promise she made because, of course, she had no idea whether Madeline Cleaver would be okay; but if there was anything she'd learned over the last few years since her shooting and subsequent therapy with Dr Burke, it was that the power of optimism should never be underestimated.

Placated, he nodded and pushed his chair away from the table, his hand sliding out from under hers in the process. He grabbed his plate and scraped what was left of the lasagne into the bin before pulling open the dishwasher and leaving the crockery inside. He hadn't heard Kate get up to bring over her plate and when he turned around to come face to face with her, his heart leapt in fright.

"Sorry, babe," she said, stifling a smile as she ducked around him to put her plate in the dishwasher.

She was just setting the machine when he asked, "More wine?" As she glanced back, looking over the kitchen island at him, he continued, "We've almost finished the bottle so…"

"Sure," she nodded. "Another glass is fine." She smiled, finished tidying the kitchen while he poured the remaining wine into their glasses before carrying them through to the living room. As soon as she was done wiping down the surfaces – she'd known before their first homemade meal together that Rick would be a messy cook – she joined him on the couch, sitting right next to him and reclining back into his embrace while he held his wine in one hand and the book he was supposed to have read and be reviewing in the other. The wine had sent a pleasant thrum of energy through her veins, a feeling that made her languidly stretch out for a moment before curling back around her husband, one of her hands resting on his torso before moving to his leg. "So, is this book any good?"

"Well it's no Poe, that's for sure," he murmured, still reading.

She chuckled, both annoyed and a little turned on by his apparent lack of interest as she ran her hand up and down his thigh. "Did you think it would be?"

"Gina said this guy was the next big thing – even hinted that he might overtake me in the bookcharts – actually had me worried for a second."

"It's nice to see you're not too full of yourself, Castle," Kate deadpanned, stopping her hand's movements and sighing to herself.

"I guess it's a good job I've got you to keep my feet firmly on the ground then, Mrs Castle." Finally he turned to her, smiling briefly. She hummed in agreement, squeezing his arm before quiet calm enveloped them for a few moments.

"Where's Alexis?"

"Said she was taking _Pi _to the movies," he replied, displaying his dislike of his daughter's latest relationship through his pronunciation of their apparent lodger's name.

Tipping back the last few sips of her wine, Kate said, "Well if it's just us, and we've got the apartment to ourselves… Think you can divert your attention from the book."

A salacious smirk spread across Rick's face at her suggestive tone as he dropped the book down onto the coffee table and palmed her waist.

"Trust me, you, Detective, are much more captivating than Mr Eliot's words. I'm sure I've read enough to give Gina a quote anyway."

"Enough talking," she mumbled before attaching her lips to his, mouth falling open instantly for his tongue. She had just enough presence of mind as his mouth descended hot on her neck to gasp out, "Castle, bedroom."

* * *

**A/N: I hope you enjoyed this. Let me know what you think! **


	5. Chapter 5

**A/N: Thank yous go to kramerjp, phnxgrl, jellybean96, QSn, hfce, KateMt1, TORONTOSUN, Moochiecat, htbuzz and alwayscastle2 for reviewing the last chapter! You guys are the best!**

* * *

The morning briefing started much like any other with Captain Gates leaving her office at eight o'clock on the dot to join her detectives in the homicide bullpen.

"Karpowski, where are we on the Michael's case?"

"Uniforms are heading back out to canvas the street again this morning and we've got a plea for witnesses to come forward out on all the news channels this morning. So far, the immediate suspects have alibied out. And there's nothing in his phone records. We're working through Mr Michael's bank records today but we've had nothing. I don't hold out much hope. CSU didn't find anything out of the ordinary at the crime scene, no prints or DNA and the search we ran last night for the gun didn't yield anything. It looks for all purposes like a random shooting, Sir-"

Gates interrupted sharply. "Keep at it, Detective."

Kate's phone vibrated in her pocket, a text message from Castle probably letting her know that he was on his way in after the lie in she let him have that morning. She'd have known for sure if Gates hadn't turned her way that second and demanded, "Beckett, Esposito, what have we got on the Cleavers and on Rachel Winters?"

She glanced at Esposito to see if he was going to speak first but he just gestured forwards for her, so she unfolded her arms and stood up from the edge of her desk, moving instead to the murder board where she could properly run through the investigation so far.

As she spoke, Gates nodded along and when she had run through all of the leads she and Castle had followed and the suspicions they currently had. When she was done, the Captain nodded and asked Esposito for a progress report on the Cleaver's murder. Unfortunately, much like Karpowski, nothing much seemed to be turning up in Ryan and Esposito's investigation.

"Can we speak to the daughter again; see if she's remembered anything else, if she was hiding anything?"

"I guess we could," Ryan answered, looking uncertain. His hesitance was understandable. The last time Kate had spoken with Maddie – the only one of them that the girl had seemed even remotely comfortable with – the few things she'd said had suggested she didn't know anything about what had happened to her parents and Kate had been reluctant to push her for more details, knowing from experience how traumatising the whole experience (even just talking to the police) was. None of them had been keen to force Maddie to relive it for them, but they had to admit it did make sense.

Just as the briefing was finishing, Gates heading back into her office and shutting the door, trusting her detectives to get straight to work and follow her orders, Castle arrived, bearing his usual two coffees and bakery treats.

"Everything okay?" he asked as he handed Kate her vanilla latte, allowing his fingers to brush purposefully over hers and catch briefly on the two rings she now wore on her left hand.

She nodded and gulped down a mouthful of the caffeinated drink that was ever so slightly too hot still. The knowledge of how Castle managed to buy coffee and bring it up to her still steaming evaded her.

"Sure?"

She sighed. "Gates wants us to bring Maddie back in, question her more thoroughly this time."

"Is it really necessary?" Castle asked, deep lines etching themselves into his forehead as he frowned, flicking his eyes towards the captain in her office for a moment.

"She might have important information, something that could crack the case open. We've made progress on Rachel's murder, sure, but the boys haven't really made any headway with Monica and James Cleaver's," Kate explained.

"Yo, Beckett, you wanna interview Madeline?"

"If you'd rather I do it-"

"-Well, you've built a rapport with her already so it makes sense," Esposito said, shrugging. Kate couldn't help the small flare of amusement in her because she knew that it wasn't just that she had been sat with Maddie last time, that the girl was obviously more comfortable around her than anyone else. But, who could blame Espo for not being comfortable around children – it wasn't like he had any of his own. Instead of voicing her thoughts however, she simply nodded and picked up the phone on her desk, dialling for Child Services to arrange getting Maddie back to the precinct.

* * *

"The big comfy couch is right through here," she stage-whispered as she showed Maddie into the breakroom, having chosen the room for the non-threatening atmosphere it had. The last thing she wanted was for the four year old girl to be scared by the cold, lifeless interview rooms they had. As soon as the girl had hopped onto the couch, Kate pushed one of the armchairs around the room until it was positioned opposite her. "Somewhere in one of these cupboards," she said, indicating the few kitchen storage units the room had, "I think there's a box of cookies. You want one?"

Maddie nodded, smiling slightly as Kate made a big show out of searching high and low, exclaiming an 'ah ha!' when she came across the sought after tin and removed one of Ryan's double chocolate chip cookies. She'd noticed as soon as Maddie had walked into the precinct, holding onto the hand of her foster mother, while the woman in question signed them both in as visitors at the front desk, that she seemed particularly pale and hoped that a sugary treat might help perk her up a bit. Plus, she couldn't help feeling that Madeline probably deserved a little spoiling, or so she told herself as she handed Maddie a second cookie. It wasn't like Ryan would mind anyway. The label on the tin bearing his name was just to ward off her husband.

"Castle will be back with a juice box for you soon. You remember him right? My husband? Big, goofy guy?" Madeline giggled, making Kate laugh. "I'll take that as a yes, then."

"Did I hear my name?" Rick asked as he entered with a carton of juice for their interviewee, Maddie's current guardian following him in and sitting beside the small, pale, blonde-haired girl occupying their couch. He crossed the room in four strides and crouched down to hand Madeline the juice. "One juice for one pretty girl."

"What do you say Madeline?"

"Thank you," Maddie whispered after a brief glance at her guardian. Kate noted that the two of them didn't seem awfully close, but she also knew that it must be hard to form a relationship with a foster parent, particularly in the aftermath of a tragedy like the one Maddie had experienced. Annalisa Marzano would probably have to be careful not to overstep her bounds, to make sure that Maddie didn't feel like she was trying to replace her parents, if they were ever going to be comfortable with one another. Perhaps it was better to try not to be judgemental.

"That's okay," Rick replied with an easy smile, patting Maddie's knee reassuringly before standing and shuffling a second chair around so he could sit to Kate's left.

"What can we do for you Detective Beckett?" Annalisa Marzano asked. It was obvious from the few words she had spoken that she was an authoritative and proper woman, the kind of person who wouldn't stand for any nonsense – it was probably why she was one of the state's Child Service's recommended foster parents.

"I just wanted to see how Maddie here is doing," Kate began, trying to reassure their only witness with an easy smile before she asked, "I wondered if you'd remembered anything else from Monday." Her heart wrenched as she watched Maddie's face crumple. "Anything you can tell us will be really helpful, Maddie. Is there anything you saw?" She caught a flash of guilt in Maddie's eyes before she glanced away, looking behind Kate and out the window into the bullpen. "Or anything you heard?"

"I'm not supposed to," Maddie mumbled.

Kate flashed a confused glance to Rick before asking, "Not supposed to what, Maddie?"

"I can't tell you. Mommy and Daddy said it was wrong."

"You know, I'm sure your mom and your dad wouldn't mind you telling Kate – she's the best secret keeper there is," Rick said, somehow managing to change his voice without sounding patronizing. It had to be a parenting thing, Kate thought while making eye contact with Maddie, hoping to reassure the girl of her husband's words.

"Whatever it is, you can tell me, Maddie."

Maddie looked uncertainly at her, quite clearly torn, but then it all came rushing out. "I was listening at the door," she blurted, looking to be on the verge of tears.

Nodding understandingly, Kate said, "It's okay, Maddie, nobody's mad at you, I promise. But this is really important. Do you remember what you heard?"

* * *

She waved fondly as Maddie turned back before disappearing into the elevator with Annalisa. The smile on her face wasn't manufactured at all; just a natural response to an incredibly sweet girl.

"Well?" Esposito asked.

"We've got a name. Alan – not a lot to go on but-"

"-We can go back to the crime scene, see if there are any calendar appointments with an Alan, check the address books. We'll run it by friends and relatives, colleagues too, see if the name rings any bells," Espo nodded, picking up on her train of thought. "Ryan and I will get right on it. Thanks, by the way."

She accepted his thanks with a nod, making her way back to her desk with Rick trailing behind her. After running through Madeline's memories of the day her parents were murdered, she had quickly shown her a picture of Marcus DeWitt, hoping to check that he hadn't been lying when he said he hadn't known the Cleavers. With Maddie not recognising him, it was a safe bet that he had nothing to do with Monica and James' murders.

At the murder board, she took down Marcus' picture and rubbed off his name, instead, writing the name Alan with a question mark under the title of suspects. It wasn't a lot to go on, but it was possible that something would turn up under the name if she went through Rachel's phone records or spoke to her friends again. Who knew, maybe the boys would find something that would tell them more about this Alan when they searched the Cleaver's apartment.

* * *

Castle nudged her as the boys returned, both of them carrying evidence bags.

"No mention of an Alan on the calendar and we couldn't find an address book," Ryan began, "But I had a brain wave." Holding up the evidence bag in his hand for them to see, he exclaimed, "Photo albums."

"Smart," Kate nodded, accepting a photo album from Javi and flipping it open. Luckily for them, beside each photo was a small paragraph, stating the date, who was in each frame and what the occasion was. The first few photos were just of Monica Cleaver, though there soon followed a couple of she and her husband together before Maddie appeared, a tiny baby dwarfed in James' arms. From that point on most of the photographs were devoted to documenting every phase of Madeline's childhood – her first tooth, her first birthday party, her first day of school, her first Halloween.

"She was a pumpkin," Rick chuckled, touching his finger to the glossy photo of Maddie, apparently taken just a few months previously when she took her first trip trick or treating with her parents.

"You didn't dress Alexis as a pumpkin, did you?"

He smirked, before replying, "I tried, but she wasn't having any of it. No, Alexis' first Halloween, she was a Smurf. Her second Halloween though, when she was three, she went as the Wicked Witch of the West. The face paint wouldn't come off for days and everywhere we went, I received plenty of judging looks because of the green tint to her skin."

Kate smiled. It was impossible not to. Rick always had such great stories about the things he and Alexis had gotten up to when she was younger. They were infinitely close, having a relationship she almost envied, even if it was suffering now with the appearance of Pi. His ability as a parent, the soft and gentle side of him that, in the beginning of their partnership, had only appeared when he was around Alexis, was the first thing she had begun to admire about him. Listening to him describe each of Alexis' Halloweens, the various costumes she'd worn – including what was obviously a pretty special gender-bend version of Chucky from _Bride of Chucky _– she couldn't help imagining what kind of antics Castle would be able to get up to with one of their kids. It was a satisfying image in her head: Rick strolling into the precinct with a toddler dangling off his hand. And she didn't have the slightest idea where it came from. They hadn't even talked about kids once, except in the context of Alexis. Would he want to have another child? But with her? Did she even want a child?

Until that moment it wasn't something she'd really stopped to think about. Sure, when she'd been younger and she'd envisioned her future, she'd seen herself married with 2.0 kids while working a successful job. She had part of that future, she knew. But never once had she thought she'd end up being a cop instead of a Chief Justice of the Supreme Court. And once she was a cop, she barely had time to think about going serious with her relationships – not that she'd ever wanted to anyway – let alone whether kids were a possibility now.

Now she was with Rick though, maybe it was something to consider.

* * *

**A/N: I decided to keep this one a bit shorter (in confession, mainly because I almost forgot to update and wrote the second half of this in a rush…) Hopefully you guys enjoyed it anyway. Let me know what you think and any theories you may have about where the storyline is going or about the case (though that's probably a lot more ambiguous right now.)**


	6. Chapter 6

**A/N: Thank you so much Moochiecat, southerngirl1, Larry Holmes, htbuzz, kramerjp, hfce, TORONTOSUN, jellybean96, phnxgrl, alwayscastle2 and any anonymous reviewers. Your support means the world.**

* * *

She sighed and set her phone down on the counter, wondering why they couldn't seem to catch a break with this case. Their plan to find this Alan, who'd apparently murdered the Cleavers in their photo albums, had completely fallen through. None of Monica Cleaver's neat notations bore any reference to an Alan. And the text she'd just received from Esposito let her know that neither James nor Monica worked with any Alan at their respective companies. If she hadn't taken a personal day in order to help Castle pack and send him on his way to the airport, she'd be slogging her way through calls and interviews just like Kevin and Javi. Instead, she was supposed to be relaxing at the breakfast bar with her bowl of chopped fruit, a lukewarm cup of coffee that she'd been neglecting for some time now and the morning's newspaper that she hadn't even read a word of.

She barely noticed Rick wander out of the bedroom in just his robe, hair still dripping from his shower and steam spiralling off his heated skin in the cooler air. He took one look at her coffee after grabbing the milk from the fridge and pouring himself a glass of it. "Everything okay?"

"Hmm?"

"Your coffee…"

"What about it?" Kate asked, dragging her eyes up from their careful inspection of all of the different coloured grey flecks in the counter.

"Well, it's almost cold and you've barely drank any of it-"

She sighed, interrupting him. "I'm just worried we're going to have to question Maddie again, see if she remembers her parents ever saying something about this Alan before he came and murdered them."

He pursed his lips. Coming to stand behind her, where he could rest his hands on her shoulders and press a kiss to the top of her head, he replied, "I know it's not ideal, but if that's what happens then it happens, Kate. And you'll handle it perfectly because you've got Maddie's best interests at heart – you can't ask for anything more than that."

She smiled softly, slightly enamoured by his faith in her. It showed more and more every day, and really she didn't think she'd done much to allow his opinion of her to be built so high, certainly she hadn't done enough for Maddie for him to make some kind of comment on how she was acting like a parent. At least, in her head, it sounded like that was what he was saying. Did that mean he wanted to talk about kids?

Suddenly her mind was racing. Was she ready for kids? She couldn't deny that there was a longing deep in her chest, that the picture of coming home to an almost silent apartment and finding Rick leaning back in his chair and typing Nikki and Rook's latest adventure with a peacefully asleep baby boy lying on his chest made her kind of want to jump up and down in a circle like a teenage girl asked out for the first time. The last two days it had been almost all she could think about. But did that mean she should come off the pill straight away?

Before she could ask him whether his reassurance was some sort of subtle hint that he thought she was ready for motherhood, he had walked back into the bedroom.

Shaking her head, she told herself she was reading too much into the situation and took her first sip of coffee before spitting the mouthful back into the mug.

"Gross," she mumbled, swallowing her own saliva reflexively to try and rid her mouth of the taste of cold coffee. Sighing, she emptied out the mug in the sink and returned to her breakfast, spearing a piece of kiwi with her fork. Her hands flipped the newspaper open while she ate, somehow turning the pages until she reached the section on books and reviews. It was still open when Rick reappeared, now wearing jeans and an unbuttoned shirt.

"Still number one on the bestseller's list?"

"Don't let it go to your head," Kate warned in answer.

"Bit of a problem there," Rick mumbled, ducking behind one of the kitchen counters. "It already has."

Rolling her eyes, Kate just put another strawberry in her mouth, not even startling when his head popped back into view.

"Do you know what happened to that sock I threw somewhere over here the other day?"

Shaking her head, she replied, "Why would I? I was in the bedroom. You know, this is why you should just drop stuff into the laundry bin, or at least hold off on the throwing until your aim gets better."

"Ooh, look at you, you're not turning into one of those wives who spends all her time moaning and griping already, are you? It's only been a month."

"You're not turning into one of those husbands who never gets to have sex with his wife because he pisses her off too much, are you?"

"Point taken," he said, holding his hands up in apology and bringing a smirk to Kate's face.

"Why's this sock so important anyway?"

"It's one of my Batman ones. I always take my Batman socks on book tours ever since Alexis bought me them the first time I had to leave her here."

Checking her father's old watch on her wrist, Kate resigned herself to going on a sock hunt. "Why don't you go and finish getting dressed and packed. I'll find the sock. You'll be late for the airport otherwise."

* * *

Finally, after she pulled his sock out from the gap between the oven and the dishwasher –though how it got there, she had no idea – they were on their way. In the back of the town car, she listened to him run through his flight details, mentally making a note of the time he expected to be checked into his hotel room. He would probably call her first, but it couldn't hurt to be prepared in case she wanted to get the jump on him. While he talked though, she was back to thinking about whether she should say something about believing she might be ready to have kids with him. Was it right to offload something like that on him when they wouldn't have a proper opportunity to discuss it afterwards?

If he noticed she seemed preoccupied still, he didn't comment on it. He just kept trying to engage her in conversation instead until their driver had brought them to JFK International Airport and stopped in the car park, getting Rick's luggage from the boot himself.

It brought a vague sense of déjà vu to Kate, standing at the departure gate with him again. This time she wouldn't be heading through it with him though.

"I'll Skype you as soon as I'm unpacked," he promised, squeezing her in a tight hug.

Nodding, she tightened her own arms about him and pressed her lips to his.

"I'll be here to pick you up on the 20th," she assured him, having come to the conclusion that it would be better to wait a while until he returned for two weeks over Christmas before trying to talk to him about extending their family. Instead, when he Skyped her, she would just tell him about what she ended up getting up to with Lanie after saying goodbye to him, and ask how his hotel was and how he thought he'd spend his downtime. Because his book tour had been split in two and he was hitting more stores than Gina had originally intended, _Black Pawn _were being charitable and had decided to give him some days here and there without a signing.

He sighed and reluctantly released her from his embrace.

While he walked through the gate, she stayed and waited until he was out of sight before going back out to the car park and asking the driver Rick had hired for the day, Billy, to take her over to Lanie's apartment. She could have just headed back to the loft but she didn't want to be treading on Alexis and Pi's toes.

* * *

"Castle's off touring again then?"

"Yeah," Kate answered, "Off to Providence first."

Lanie nodded, continuing along the sidewalk; oblivious to the fact that Kate had stopped walking until her question about whether she would fly out to see him went unanswered. "Kate?" Whirling around, Lanie searched for her best friend amid the busy street, double-taking as she saw her staring into the window of _Babies R Us. _"Is there something you have to tell me, Kate Beckett?" she demanded, joining her at the storefront.

"What? No!"

"Oh my God, you are so pregnant! How far along are you?!"

"Lanie!" Kate gasped.

"When did you find out? Why didn't you tell me?"

"Because I'm not pregnant, that's why."

"You're not?"

"Gee, do you have to be so disappointed, Lanie?"

"Sorry, I just, you know, thought I was going to get to be an aunt and you know it…kinda went straight to my head." Kate nodded understandingly at Lanie's explanation. "If you're not pregnant though, why are you staring into the _Babies R Us _window," she enquired.

Kate shrugged. She honestly wasn't sure. They'd just been walking past when something in the corner of her eye had caught her attention and she'd paused, looking directly at a onesie. There was nothing remotely special about it, except for the little family of elephants all walking in a line across the chest of the piece, holding onto each other's tails, but somehow it captivated her.

"Are you and Castle…talking about kids?"

"No."

"But you want to," Lanie guessed.

Sighing, Kate asked, "Is that crazy? We only just got married and suddenly I want kids. I swear I'm turning into some kind of broody, obsessed woman. It's ridiculous, isn't it? You can be honest."

"Kate, honey, it's not crazy at all." One of Lanie's hands reached out and squeezed Kate's arm. "Come on, let's get out of the cold and have a coffee and we'll talk about it."

"Sure." Kate gave one last glance at the elephant patterned babygrow before stepped away from the window and taking a few quick steps, lengthening her stride enough that she soon drew level with her best friend.

* * *

When Kate left the little coffee shop she and Lanie had ended up in she felt much cheerier than when she had left Rick at the airport. Between them, she and Lanie had really talked through Kate's recent feelings and decided that when Rick was back for Christmas, broaching the topic would be wise. Besides, it wasn't like Rick would say no. They both knew he loved kids, would jump at the chance to father another one. Brimming with happiness as she was, Kate sent the driver on his way and, regardless of the distance, strolled home enjoying the blustery breeze on her face and the smell of freshly baked bagels from a café she passed.

If the sandy haired boy dangling on his mother's arm staring and smiling at her while they waited to cross the road wasn't a sign that everything would work out, she didn't know what was.

She shook her head at that thought while the elevator took her up to the floor their loft occupied. If Rick were there, he would have been acting very smug. He couldn't resist the chance to remind her how different, how closed off she'd been when they first met and marvel at all the things he managed to bring out in her. He'd been incredibly surprised to discover she actually enjoyed cuddling and snuggling outside of the bedroom when they first started dating. Now there wasn't much else she had to surprise him with except for her readiness for kids.

She was still smiling as she unlocked the front door and stepped inside, dropping her bag and keys on kitchen counter, freezing as the unmistakable sound of crying hit her ears.

Hesitantly, she called out, "Alexis?" She winced while waiting for her step-daughter to answer. Was this a moment she should be intruding on?

"Oh, Kate, you're back," Alexis said, appearing at the top of the stairs still teary-eyed and red faced.

"Is everything okay? Where's Pi?" She asked, looking around the apartment.

"He left," Alexis whispered, sitting herself down on one of the stairs.

Crossing the room, Kate sat beside the redhead and slung an arm around her shoulders, pulling Alexis into her side where she promptly began crying again. "What happened? Did you fight?"

It took her a few moments to decipher Alexis' blubbered reply. But once she had, she was murmuring soothing things into her ear, trying to find the right things to say.

"He said I was too serious, that we didn't fit."

"That's not necessarily a bad thing, you know. Alexis, you have drive and ambition, but you also know when to sit back and relax, when to have fun. That's something that took me years to learn, and even then, your dad still has to remind me sometimes. Maybe Pi wasn't the right guy, but I promise he'll come along eventually."

Alexis nodded and wiped her eyes. "I just want to find what you and Dad have. You fit so well even though you're so different."

"You'll find it." Confiding in Alexis, Kate revealed, "I didn't think I'd ever find what your dad and I share. I spent so long in other relationships, the ones that were nothing like the commitment I feel to Rick, the love we have for each other, that I didn't actually recognise what I was even feeling at first. You're already one step ahead than I was when I was your age Alexis. One of these days, you're going to meet a great guy, a guy who makes you smile and laugh when you're angry and annoyed, a guy who wants what's best for you, who'll put your interests above almost anything. It'll happen as long as you let it."

"Thanks, Kate," Alexis mumbled, starting to look embarrassed by the situation.

Smiling gently, Kate squeezed her shoulders gently once before standing up and asking, "Ice cream or popcorn?"

Alexis grinned deviously, every bit her father's daughter as she replied, "Both."

"Great. I'll get the food, you choose the movie."

* * *

**A/N: So nothing on the case this chapter, but hopefully still an interesting chapter. Let me know what you think! On a side note, I don't have enough time to properly read through this chapter this week because I'm in the pressure cooker with my essays. So, if you do find a mistake or typo, feel free to let me know and I will go back and correct it. **


	7. Chapter 7

**A/N: It's a shorter chapter this week guys since I've had a mad week of essay writing and packing up ready to go home again, so I thought maybe it would be fun to have a chapter focusing on Rick out on his booktour. Thank you to everyone who has reviewed this story and put it in their favourites and alerts. **

* * *

It had been a day. A day. Twenty four whole hours. And already he missed her like crazy. The bed was empty without her, cold despite the warm temperature the hotel maintained in the room. True to his word, he'd unzipped his laptop bag and taken out the Apple Macbook the second he was alone in his room, booting it up in no time. Skype automatically loaded up for him and then it was just a small matter of waiting for Kate to come online before he could speak to her and then say goodnight before hanging up and heading to bed.

At the sound of Paula knocking on his door, each impact of her knuckles insistent and loud, he groaned and rolled over, pulling one of the spare pillows over his head.

"Richard Castle, if you know what's good for you, you'll come out here and open this door before I go and get a member of staff to do it for me!" his agent threatened.

Grumbling to himself, he stood, wrapping the duvet around his mostly naked body as he ambled to the door, rubbing sleep from his eyes with his closed fists.

"Alright, alright, I'm coming!" he called, growing annoyed with the continued banging noise. The door was light in his hand as he wrenched it open with what was probably far too much force than strictly needed. "What?"

"Gina's set up an interview for you. You need to be ready in thirty minutes. David Logue from _Providence Journal_ will be in the bar. Just whatever you do, don't give too much information about _Raging Heat_."

"I know, I know," he yawned.

Paula let herself into the room as he stepped back from the door and went back to the wardrobe he'd made sure to hang his clothes in to avoid creases, pulling down a pair of grey dress pants. His black shirt was the next thing he pulled on, then the jacket that matched his trousers. He could have picked a tie out himself, he was sure, but Paula stepped in and pulled down a striped blue one for him anyway, flinging it at his chest before leaving the suite with just a call of, "Don't fuck it up, Rick," over her shoulder.

"Don't fuck it up, Rick," he mocked, pulling a face. "Does she think I'm a rookie at this? Please."

* * *

The hotel lobby was a little crowded, but it was easy to discern David Logue from the crowd. Although he was sat in a sea of men dressed smartly in suits or shirts and ties, it didn't even take Rick's writerly observances to work out his identity. The proudly displayed press pass was a dead giveaway. Still, he'd have guessed the guy was a journalist from the leather messenger bag on the couch next to him and the sturdy black glasses perched on his nose. Even the man's hair – carefully set and well-trimmed – was stereotypical of a news reporter.

Adjusting his tie, Rick plastered a charming grin across his face and strode across to the small area of couches just beside the bar. He was still a good three metres away when his interviewer caught sight of him and jumped to his feet.

"Richard Castle!" he exclaimed, drawing the attention of everyone in the bar as well as the people queuing for the reception desk.

"Call me Rick."

* * *

"So is there a title for _Nikki Heat's _sixth adventure?" Logue enquired.

Nodding, Rick answered, "Yep. Hot off the press too. I only just had it cleared with my publishers, _Black Pawn, _but I can officially say that the next _Nikki Heat _book will be titled _Raging Heat_."

"Any chance you can give us a few sneaky hints on what the novel's plot might be?"

Rick laughed, trying his hardest to make it sound simultaneously genuine and easy. "I'm afraid not. My agent and publisher would strangle me if I released that information. Plus, there's still a lot of work to be done on the book."

"That's right, you just got back from your honeymoon."

Nodding, Rick continued, "It's not coming out until September. I may change my mind on the plot – it's happened before."

Logue jotted down a few odd notes in his notebook – a task that seemed slightly unimportant when there was a Dictaphone with a mini microphone pointing in his direction.

"So you've been married, what, a month now? How's it going so far?"

Shifting in his seat, Rick took a moment before replying. As far as he was aware, the interview was supposed to be about raising awareness of his book tour and his next book, boosting sales; not his and Kate's personal lives. "Kate and I are very happy, thank you." Luckily for him, that was the only question David Logue asked him about his recent marriage. After that, Rick was able to just talk about which cities his tour was hitting and what he might get up to on his days off. He was still thankful when the reporter turned off the recording equipment and stowed it away in his beg, even more so when they shook hands and went their separate ways – Logue to the hotel entrance and he back up to his hotel room.

As soon as he let himself in with his key card, he loosened his tie and flung it over the back of a chair. His suit jacket swiftly followed, such was his determination to relax for at least a few minutes. The idea of returning to bed, maybe napping, was incredibly alluring; but before he could flop face first onto the plush mattress, his phone began ringing.

"Kate!" he exclaimed as soon as he had slid his thumb across the screen to accept her call.

"Hey," she replied, sounding kind of surprised by his enthusiastic greeting. "How's Providence?"

"Fine."

There was a slight pause before she said, "You haven't left the hotel, have you?"

"I've left the hotel _room_…"

Chuckling, Kate scolded him. "You should head out and get some fresh air! I thought you'd at least want to go to the Athenaeum, you know follow in Poe's footsteps."

"Maybe tomorrow," he yawned.

"Okay," she relented. "I was actually calling to give you some news."

"News?"

"Yeah, about the case – Rachel's case, that is."

"Yeah?" he asked, feeling his excitement rise again.

"We caught a lead-"

"-That's great!"

"Thanks," Kate murmured.

"So what is it?"

"We might know who it was that was threatening Rachel. According to one of her friends who was out of town when we were questioning Debbie, Maggie, Hayley and Samantha, Rachel had an impulse problem-"

"-You mean she was a shopaholic," he interrupted.

"Yeah, babe, she was a shopaholic, had quite a bad credit situation actually, so she couldn't afford her dad's medical treatment or the care home that he's now in, even with selling the apartment. Ryan printed out mugshots of all the loan sharks we have on file to show to Henry, and he recognised one of them. We've got a BOLO out on him now."

"You think it was him?"

"I don't know, Rick. Hopefully, this guy can at least help us get to the bottom of Rachel's murder."

"So did she say anything else, this friend?"

"Just that Rachel was considering quitting her job. I'm meeting with her boss soon to discuss whether she'd handed in her resignation or spoken to her about it. Henry didn't tell us that Rachel was leaving though."

Rick nodded. It seemed like they were finally getting some traction on the case. Unfortunately for him, he wasn't even there.

* * *

The next morning he woke to the sound of his alarm, tightened his grip on his pillow and moaned, "Kate, turn it off," before remembering she was back in New York and blearily opening one eye to search for his phone and shut up the beeping. Sighing, he threw back the covers and rolled into a sitting position, feet hitting the polished wooden floors as he stretched out the kinks in his back. He needed to stop sleeping on his front – it did his posture no good.

It was his first signing though and all that was required of him was sitting in a chair for a few hours before grabbing his laptop and heading to a coffee shop with a view where he could try and get some writing done or Skype Alexis while Kate was out at work. So he yawned and stretched once more before pushing his weight onto his feet and standing. With any luck, he could be dressed and down in the restaurant for breakfast before Paula came knocking on his door.

* * *

The signing had passed by quickly, though it wasn't the busiest event he'd ever held. As soon as the last book had been signed and the line of people waiting dissipated, he was up, grabbing his laptop bag from Paula, and leaving. The coffee shop he was sat in caught his attention while he was walking along the riverfront. The sign outside advertising exciting blends of coffee and unusual flavours had piqued his curiosity to the point his feet had carried him across the threshold before he'd even finished reading.

"Hi, what can I get you?" the barista – a young girl dressed in a green apron with a row of charity pins and badges across the neck – asked, smiling brightly at him.

"Er…" Stumbling to look at the menu of drinks above her head, he skim-read every item before deciding he would try what the shop had called the 'Nutty Maple Latte' and handing over the appropriate amount of money for it.

"Coming right up. Go on and take a seat, I'll bring it over to you."

Nodding his thanks, Rick unhooked his laptop bag from his shoulder and chose a seat near the window where he could appreciate the view and watch the people passing by. Within minutes, just as he was opening what he had of _Raging Heat _so far, the barista – whose name tag he now saw read Angie – placed his cup of coffee down on the table along with a small selection of cookies.

"Another writer, huh?"

"Sorry?" Rick asked, looking up in confusion.

"You're an author, right?" she replied, placing her now empty tray under one arm so she could point at his laptop screen. He nodded cautiously, wondering if she recognised him. "You're the second we've had in today, though Tim over there is a regular." He followed her faze over to the college-age kid working with a pen and paper, scrawling furiously across the page. "Anyway, I'll let you get on."

"Thanks," he murmured, turning his eyes away from the kid and back to his computer screen.

He took a few moments to reread the last few sentences

"_Someone should call the meteorologists," Rook said while looking up and scanning the sky._

_Heat shared a look with detectives Raley and Ochoa before asking the question they were all thinking. "Why?"_

"_Because it is literally raining men!"_

There was something about that line that just didn't quite read right. Sighing, Rick picked up his coffee and took a sip while he thought of a few variations of the sentence, trying to figure out which one sounded best.

"Huh." _Damn good coffee._

The cup was soon finished, the cookies ignored in favour of the rich sweetness and almost woodsy flavour of the latte. He'd yet to think of a solution to his problem, but the plot of the story was continuing to unfold on the page before him.

_Heat rolled her eyes. She knew there was a reason she had almost said no when he'd asked if he could give her a lift into work. The only reason she hadn't was because he had only just returned from his assignment in Europe the night before and she wanted to spend some more time with him, even if it was just thirty minutes extra in the car. It would have been fine if she hadn't received a call about a body minutes after they had left her apartment. He'd promised to get a taxi from the scene, knowing how urgent it was that she got there swiftly, but once he saw the body lying on top of a car that looked as if a small missile had been dropped onto it there was she knew he would be hanging around._

"_Actually, Rook," Lauren Parry said, "our vic here was thrown from quite a height. Judging from the trajectory, it doesn't even look as if he was pushed from one of these buildings."_

"_Have we got any ID yet?"_

_Ochoa held up an evidence bag containing the victim's wallet. _

Rick startled as noise starting coming from his laptop speakers – the odd ringtone for Skype. It was Alexis calling though, so he saved his progress and maximised the calling programme.

"Hi Daddy," his daughter said.

"Alexis," he grinned, before looking past her pale, smiling face and noticing that the décor of the wall behind her was not something that could be found in the loft. "Where are you?"

"Oh, I'm in my dorm room. Kelly just left so I thought I'd call you." She smiled again. "So, how's the tour?"

He frowned, wondering why she'd gone back to the dorms at NYU. Before he left for Providence, she'd been perfectly happy to stay at home and commute to the campus whenever she had classes. Still, if Alexis wasn't going to tell him why, he could always ask Kate later.

"So far so good," he told her. "I just had the best coffee – it's got maple syrup in it!"

* * *

"I love you Dad!"

"Bye, Pumpkin, I love you."

Disconnecting the call, Rick leaned back in his chair and ate one of his cookies – something ginger-flavoured. After speaking with Alexis, he'd lost the flow of exactly where he was heading with his current chapter. The view of the winter sun shining harsh and bright on the river, light reflecting off the surface was much more appealing. Finishing up his cookies, Rick brushed the crumbs off his hands before shutting down his laptop and placing it back in his bag. He waved a goodbye to Angie and then left, enjoying the warmth of the sun on his face in the oddly absent breeze. It was oddly mild for the middle of November.

Remembering what Kate had said the evening before about the library, he pulled up Google maps on his phone and started walking.

* * *

**A/N: So, like I said, a relatively short chapter, but hopefully it was still interesting. As always let me know what you think! **


	8. Chapter 8

**A/N: Thank you so much everyone who's following this story. I'm so grateful for your feedback. Apologies for this slightly late update. It's been a busy weekend, and I'm still rushing to get this up. My check for mistakes has been very quick, so there may still be some things in there. If you spot a typo or an error of any kind please do let me know. Otherwise, I hope you like this chapter. **

* * *

Kate woke to the smell of coffee percolating, the aromatic scent pulling her from dreams of a perfect little blue eyed boy. Smiling, she shucked the comforter and joined Alexis out in the kitchen.

"Since when did you start liking coffee so much?" she asked, tying the cord of her robe. It was the third morning since Rick had left that she'd found her stepdaughter in the kitchen with a mug of coffee.

Alexis just shrugged and laughed her question off with a, "I've always liked coffee, Kate."

Still, she wasn't quite convinced. Sure, Alexis would occasionally join she and Rick for a coffee, but she usually drank mocha rather than straight coffee. Judging from the colour of her drink, it didn't even look like there was that much milk in it. When she'd finished filling her own cup, the difference between the two was quite surprising.

"Did you speak to your dad yesterday? Tell him you were moving back into your dorm room?"

"Yeah, he said he'd speak to you today. Thanks for all the help moving my stuff back by the way. I've just got one more suitcase and two boxes left."

"I can drop them round this morning or this evening," Kate offered. If they'd hired a small moving van, it could have all been done in one journey, but with just her squad car, Kate had been forced into making a few trips. Not that she minded of course. It would be quiet and lonely for the most part in the loft once Alexis had moved all her stuff back to NYU. Martha only seemed to appear every so often, spending the majority of her time overseeing her drama students, especially now her little school had enjoyed an influx of newcomers ever since their latest play had won good media attention.

"Haven't you got a lead to chase up this morning?"

"Yeah, but the boys can start without me."

"It's okay, Kate. This evening is fine – gives me more time to have a last minute check through this place to make sure I've not forgotten anything."

"If you're sure-"

"-I'm sure," Alexis promised, smiling easily.

* * *

While the boys slogged their way through the Cleavers' financials yet again, looking for any trace that they could be involved with the loan shark Rachel had borrowed money from, Beckett was heading out to meet with the woman who ran _Six Degrees of Celebration, _Joan Glenn.

Walking through the familiar entrance hall, Kate couldn't help remembering the last time she had been to the building that was occupied by the event planning business. It had been just after Rachel's death, when everything was still so fresh. The only thing that made her able to smile was remembering Castle's fussing in the elevator. Her scheduled meeting with Henry and his and Rachel's boss was in the conference room though, so there would be nothing else to remind her of those awful few days.

"Detective Beckett, please come in and sit down," Henry said, standing and apparently waiting for her outside the open door. She nodded her thanks and followed his instructions, introducing herself and shaking hands with the auburn-haired woman who had to be Joan Glenn while Henry shut the door behind her and gave the meeting its privacy.

"How can we help you Detective Beckett?"

"I have a few questions about Rachel's professional decisions. One of her friends recently mentioned to me that she was considering leaving _Six Degrees of Celebration_-"

"-That's correct. Rachel and I had spoken about it. Your wedding was to be the last one she planned for us. She was going to hand in her resignation to me as soon as soon as her job was done."

"Right," Beckett nodded, glad that Joan's account confirmed what she had been told by Jennifer Leyland just the day before. "Were you aware that Rachel was planning to set up her own wedding planning business?"

"No. Though obviously that's not the kind of thing Rachel would tell me if we were to be competitors."

"What about you, Henry? Did you know?"

Rachel's former assistant looked awkward, shifting in his seat and shooting a fearful look towards his boss before replying quietly, "Yeah, I knew. Can't say I thought it was wise, but she'd told me she wanted to start up her own business so she could delegate and have more control over her hours."

Kate nodded. She'd thought as much. With everything that had happened in Rachel's life – her father's debilitating illness and the news that the daughter she'd only just begun to get into contact with was also seriously ill – it was only natural that she would re-evaluate what was important in her life. It was an educated guess, however, that the reason Rachel had wanted to start her own business where she would have more of an overseeing role was so that she would have more time to spend with Madeline Cleaver.

"And she never changed her mind? She still intended to leave?"

"As far as I know," Henry answered, shrugging his shoulders.

"This business she was going to set up? Do you have any idea how she was going to finance that?"

Both Joan and Henry pulled equal expressions of innocent oblivion, minutely shaking their heads. Studying their faces, the way the push of Henry's bottom lip up into his upper was mirrored on Joan's, Kate decided that she could trust them.

"When I saw you yesterday, Henry you identified this man, Jamie Alanson – said you saw him speaking with Rachel one day." She held up the printed photo of their suspect in all his tattooed glory for both Joan and Henry to see again. "Were you aware that this man is a loan shark or that Rachel had difficulties acquiring the funds to move her father into a care home?"

* * *

"Beckett, I need an update on this case," Gates requested the second Kate entered the bullpen.

"Sir."

Shutting the office door behind her, Kate stood opposite her boss and met her expectant gaze. "I just spoke with Joan Glenn. Rachel hadn't handed in her notice, but as far as we can tell, she still intended to leave and start her own business. We won't know for certain until we find Alanson, but it would seem that that was what she received the second sum of money for."

"And where are we on finding him?"

"So far we've got nothing. It's been almost twenty four hours and we've had no reports of sightings or arrests from any of the cities precincts. Espo was going to put some feelers out in Robbery, to see if any of their guys might know which parts of the city Alanson operates in."

"Keep at it," Gates instructed. "What about this business of Ms Winter's? Could that have been a motive for her boss?"

"Joan didn't seem to know anything about it, but it's possible," Kate replied, admitting that her read of the late-forties events planner could be wrong. It wouldn't be the first time she had bought into a murderer's story. Joan Glenn didn't strike her as the next 3XK though.

Gates nodded thoughtfully, processing everything Detective Beckett had told her. "For now Alanson seems our most likely suspect so I want you to keep working that."

"Sir."

Ryan looked up from his computer as Gates' office door clicked shut. Nodding at Beckett, he pushed back from his computer slightly.

"Find anything?"

"No. Everything in these financials is normal, completely above board. Unless the Cleavers had a secret second bank account, they didn't have any involvement with Jamie Alanson. Judging from this account they wouldn't have had any need for one though."

Sighing, Kate perched on the edge of her desk. "Who knows, maybe Alan isn't Alanson. It could just be coincidental. We still don't know for certain that we're looking for the same killer."

"Though the lack of crime scene evidence would suggest that whoever murdered Rachel is also responsible for James and Monica Cleavers' deaths. Most people aren't that meticulous in removing trace evidence or not leaving any in the first place." Kate watched as he pushed his hands through his hair and turned his neck, stretching out the muscles to get rid of tension.

"You look tired, Ry."

He didn't deny it. "Sarah Grace didn't want to sleep at all last night. Colick."

"If you want a break any time, just say the word. You know Rick and I would be happy to watch her. You and Jenny must be craving some time to yourselves." It had been a week into their honeymoon when Kate and Rick had received a phone call from Kevin to tell them that Jenny had gone into premature labour and given birth to a healthy – thankfully – six pound baby girl, though with the two cases they were currently working, she and Rick hadn't yet had time to actually see the newest member of their extended family.

"Thanks, I might have to take you up on that offer. It's only one o'clock and I've already had three espressos. I don't think I can cope with more sleepless nights."

* * *

"Yo Beckett, I just got back from meeting Blake. I've got a possible location for Alanson."

"Let's go," she responded, immediately grabbing her grey peacoat and walking with Esposito to the elevator.

"Ryan not coming?"

Beckett shook her head. "Poor guy's wiped out. I told him to take a quick nap on the breakroom couch while Gates is out for lunch."

"This is why babies are a bad thing."

"You don't want kids, Javi?"

"I'm a lone wolf, Beckett. I can't be tied down," he said, piling on the charm that he usually reserved for picking up girls at _The Old Haunt_ and the other bars and clubs they sometimes frequented.

Rolling her eyes, Kate couldn't help commenting, "Why do you keep going back to Lanie then?"

Espo's eyes bulged comically. "You know?"

"Know what?" she asked innocently.

"Don't you bat your eyelashes at me, Beckett. You know what I'm talking about," he hissed, shooting warning glances at the desk sergeant and detectives and uniforms filling the entrance to the 12th Precinct as they stepped out onto the street.

"You mean the fact that you and Lanie ended up in bed together after my wedding reception?" Kate left Esposito stuttering as she rounded the car and got in on the passenger side. "Hurry up. We haven't got all day, Espo!"

* * *

Jamie Alanson was not a pleasant man to look at. His mouth was drooped on one side in a permanent scowl – an unfortunate scar from a bar brawl that had resulted in one of his teeth splitting his lip – despite his young twenty eight years. Although he was close in age to Rachel, that was where any similarities between them ended. While Rachel dressed professionally in well-tailored suits and designer clothes, Alanson sat in their interrogation room in a baseball cap and a grease-stained vest that left most of his tattoos on show, and a tattered pair of ripped jeans.

Entering the interrogation room together, Esposito sat first, drawing their suspect's attention. It was their designated play – force Alanson into seeing Espo in a position of power. While his focus was on Javi, Kate was free to make her observations, and could at any point during the interview supersede Esposito's dominance. Though she was used to being in charge during interrogations, she'd noticed in the past that Castle sometimes took advantage of how most of their perps didn't pay him much heed. It made him more useful in a way. Oftentimes his observances meant that the questions he asked were more poignant, catching 'dirt bags' out on their lies. In the observation room, they'd decided too that Espo would hit hard and fast.

"Why'd you kill Rachel Winters, Jamie?"

"I didn't."

Espo shared a look with Beckett. Neither of them had expected the loan shark to immediately confess, but neither had they figured he'd be such a cool cucumber.

"You loaned her money, she didn't pay it back, there's gotta be a repercussion for that though, right?"

Alanson shrugged. "Who says I loaned her anything?"

"Her bank records."

"Okay, so I gave her some money. 'S'far as I'm aware charity's not exactly a crime."

"You're calling yourself a charitable benefactor?"

"I give people money when they need it," Alanson pointed out.

"Yeah and demand it back with exorbitant interest," Beckett bit out, speaking for the first time and drawing their suspect's appraising eyes. She resisted the urge to roll her eyes. The number of criminals who walked through their precinct doors and couldn't see past her pretty face both irked and astounded her. "So how much did you charge Rachel?"

"I told you. Nothing."

"You expect us to believe that you just gave her ten thousand dollars? Just like that? No interest? No repayment scheme of any kind?"

"Well she was my cousin," Alanson said.

* * *

**A/N: I decided to end it here. Let me know your thoughts!**


	9. Chapter 9

**A/N: You guys are awesome! I can't believe how many of you are following this story! All I can say is thank you. I'm just glad that you guys like what I'm doing. **

* * *

"_You expect us to believe that you just gave her ten thousand dollars? Just like that? No interest? No repayment scheme of any kind?"_

"_Well she was my cousin," Alanson said._

* * *

Beckett sat in shock. "She was your _cousin?_"

"Yeah, twice removed on her mother's side," he elaborated, shrugging because he didn't understand why his family tree was such a big issue.

In the observation room, Gates closed her eyes. They'd really thought that Alanson was their culprit but with this revelation it looked like they would be going back to the proverbial drawing board. Twenty minutes later that was how she found Detective Beckett – staring down the murder board as if it would suddenly highlight the name or picture of their murderer in flashing yellow lights.

"So Alanson's not our guy?"

"Nope. Ryan just checked. They really were cousins. He gave Rachel the money to get her father into his care home which squares with what we saw in her financials – a significant portion of the transfer went straight towards paying her father's fees. Apparently it was a long-term loan that Rachel would eventually pay back when her business had taken off. As soon as her father's apartment sold; she'd have enough money coupled with the remainder of Jamie Alanson's loan to get her company off the ground."

"And he doesn't have any other information for us to follow up?"

"Sorry, Sir."

Gates sighed. She knew Beckett was working this case as thoroughly if not as hard as she'd run her mother's. But the likelihood of finding Rachel Winters' killer was becoming even slimmer as each of their leads came to nothing. Against all of their better judgement, the evidence of their victim's involvement with a loan shark had made each of them more than hope that they had finally caught their guy.

"Beckett!"

Looking up, Kate saw Esposito hurrying towards her.

"Yeah?"

"I was just organising Alanson's release, bringing him up from holding when he asked if we'd spoken to her boyfriend-"

Kate's brow furrowed. "Boyfriend? She didn't have a boyfriend-"

"Exactly! Nobody else we spoke to knew anything about Rachel being in a relationship. We need to re-interview Jamie, see if he knows who this guy is."

"Call the front desk; don't let Alanson leave the building!" Beckett ordered, pointing at Ryan even as she ran for the stairs, not trusting the elevator to get her to the ground floor in time to stop Rachel's cousin from leaving the building before she could speak to him. She was breathless by the time she had hurtled down three flights of stairs and sprinted the length of the 12th Precinct's entrance room. It took a flash of her eyes to the right to notice the desk sergeant with the phone to his ear, probably speaking to Ryan, and her heart sank. She slowed, breathing deeply while searching for the faded red vest Alanson had been wearing and his spiky short brown hair; believing it was a vain effort and that he'd already left the building. Spotting him literally with one foot out of the open front door, her voice was full of authority as she called out, "Alanson, stop right there!"

She watched Jamie Alanson raise his hands in the air and slowly rotate on the spot, sarcastically saying, "Great. What is it I've supposedly done now?"

"I just have a few last questions for you. You asked my partner if we'd spoken to Rachel's boyfriend, but no-one else seems to know anything about this relationship."

* * *

As she rode the lift back up to the fourth floor, she quickly pulled out her phone and dialled Castle, knowing he'd want to hear how the case was going and how close they were to solving it. _Pick up, pick up_, she chanted while she listened to the repeated ringing sound only to receive his voicemail. Paying no attention to his message about being busy sword fighting with Blackbeard, she tried to recall what his schedule for the next few days was but she couldn't whether remember whether he was meant to be signing books or was travelling either to his hotel or to another city. She'd have to check with the timetable he'd printed off and stuck to the front of the fridge with a magnet. Pocketing her phone, she stepped off the elevator and walked straight into Esposito, Ryan and Captain Gates.

"Well?"

"She had a boyfriend," Kate said.

"Who was…" Ryan and Esposito simultaneously prompted.

"None other than our newest Congressman-"

"-Alan Woods?! I knew there was something dodgy about him. I'm glad I voted for Nichols now, even if he lost the election!"

"Let's not be hasty, Esposito," Gates cautioned. "We can't just arrest Congressman Woods. If we're going to pull him in for questioning, I want to make damn sure we have more evidence of his involvement with Rachel Winters than just the word of a convicted loan shark."

"Sir," the three detectives responded, looking disappointedly at one another behind their Captain's retreating back. Once she was sealed off in her office doing whatever it was she spent the majority of her time doing, Beckett took the lead. "Alright, let's get to work. I'm going to get onto Henry from her office and have her diary sent over. You guys-"

"-I'll check phone records," Ryan volunteered, "See if any of the numbers can be traced to Woods."

"And I'll see if I can place Rachel at any of Woods' recent events, link them that way."

Beckett nodded. There often came a moment in their cases where they could feel that they were closing in on their guilty suspect. It was palpable at that moment. Bolstered by their recent success, the three detectives got to work, Beckett pulling her phone from its cradle and dialling the office line for _Six Degrees of Celebration _once more. Hopefully it would be the last time she had to do so.

* * *

Back at the apartment after a long day, Kate wanted nothing more than to sink into a candlelit, bubble bath in the enormous tub in their en suite. Unfortunately, she'd told Alexis she'd help her get the last of her things that had moved back into the loft while she stayed over her summer break and while she was with Pi to her room at the NYU campus.

"Alexis?"

Her stepdaughter's ginger-haired head poked around the corner at the top of the stairs. "Hi, I'm just bringing the last box down."

Kate nodded, removing her badge, gun and holster and setting them on the kitchen counter while she waited. It took them a few trips to take the last cardboard boxes containing Alexis' clothes and books down to her car, but they were soon on their way.

"How's the case going?"

"Good," Kate replied, taking her eyes off the road for a moment to smile at Alexis. "I think we're close to catching the guy. We're just making sure we're going to have enough evidence to make an arrest."

"That's great! You guys have been working really hard on this one. I'm sure you'll get the evidence you need."

Sharing a brief smile, Kate turned the attention back to her stepdaughter. "So, what are you planning to get up to with your roommate this year? More all-night _Lord of the Rings_ marathons? A convention or two?"

"We haven't really talked about anything yet, but yeah we'll probably be doing something of that ilk. Or maybe we'll do _The Hobbit _instead this time around. It's still got Orlando Bloom in it, plus you know, Tauriel's kinda badass."

Beckett chuckled. Sometimes Alexis was exactly like her father. Although he'd harped on for days on end about how far Peter Jackson had moved away from the plot JRR Tolkien had actually written, he couldn't deny that he had fallen ever so slightly in love with Evangeline Lily's Tauriel.

"_Everyone loves a badass, Kate," he'd said. "Why do you think I fell in love with you?"_

"_I kind of thought it was because I was a 'mystery you were never going to solve.'" _

_He faked a shocked gasp. "You're using my words against me!"_

After dropping Alexis' last boxes in her room, Kate watched her start opening up each of the boxes, checking their contents before shifting them around to make unloading them easier.

"Well, thanks for all the help, Kate-"

"-Anytime."

"I guess I should start unpacking."

Kate dithered for a moment, soaking in the awkward atmosphere. Had Rick been there, he would have wrapped Alexis in a great, warm hug, practically squeezed the life out of her before kissing the top of her head and saying goodbye. She felt Alexis needed some kind of physical comfort, but although they were certainly closer than they had been when she first began dating her father, they'd never really had the kind of relationship that included hugs.

"You wanna grab dinner somewhere?" she said eventually, rocking on the balls of her feet almost nervously.

* * *

"This place is great," Alexis enthused, twirling her fork through her plateful of seafood tagliatelle.

"I used to come here with my mum," Kate confided. "It was kind of a tradition. Every time I went back to college, we'd come out on my last night." She hadn't planned on continuing her family tradition with Alexis, but somehow it just felt right. When her stepdaughter had agreed to go out to dinner with her, it was the first place she'd thought of, knowing that it was the perfect place for them to go.

"Thanks for sharing this place with me then," Alexis said with a hesitant smile.

After finishing their main courses, the waiter brought over the dessert menus and recommended the black cherry, chocolate tart. Even though their server continued to list the other sweet delicacies on offer, Kate had seen the way Alexis' eyes had lit up at the recommendation and ordered two.

"This is amazing," Alexis exclaimed, moaning around her spoon. "_So _much better than a smorlette."

"Anything's better than a smorlette!"

Laughing, the two finished up their desserts and while Alexis made a trip to the ladies' room, Kate settled the bill, leaving what little extra cash she had as a tip.

* * *

After finally saying goodbye to Alexis and driving back to the loft, Kate closed her eyes in relief as she removed her heels and stretched out the cramp in her feet. Full of good food and tired after work, the bathtub was calling to her but she expected Rick would be calling soon. Making sure she had her cellphone, Kate grabbed the house phone from the dock and carried it through to the bathroom. While the bath ran, she pulled off her clothes, leaving them in the laundry basket, and wrapped herself in Rick's robe while she waited for the tub to fill. Along with the bubbles, she poured in some lavender oil and lit one of the relaxation candles that she'd brought back from the spa retreat the girls had taken her to for her bachelorette party.

When her cellphone rang, she was up to her neck in bubbles, so relaxed she was actually drifting off. Rubbing her eyes, she held the phone up to her ear and answered. "Hey, Babe."

"Hey, sorry I missed your call earlier. What's up? Something happen with the case?"

"Yeah something happened."

"You caught the guy, didn't you?" Rick asked, excitement spilling out of him. "It was this Alanson, right?"

"Actually no, it wasn't Alanson. And we haven't caught him yet, but we're close, really close."

"Kate, that's great! I knew you could solve Rachel's murder!"

She smiled softly at her husband's faith, shifting slightly to work some feeling back into her leg. The pause on the other end of the phone was tangible.

"Are you- You're not in the bath, are you, Kate?"

"I might be," she admitted, smirking as she lifted a leg purposefully out of the water so he would hear the water dripping off of her skin.

"Two more weeks, two more weeks."

Chuckling at his chanting, Kate tried to ignore how much the thought of reunion sex in two weeks' time when he was back for Thanksgiving appealed to her.

"Two weeks is nothing," he said, more to himself than to his wife. "We can cope with being apart for two weeks."

* * *

**A/N: Thanks for reading! I'm probably going to have one or two more chapters with Rick out on his book tour but then he'll be back. Those of you who are missing him, hold on! I might also, write at least part of the next few chapters from Rick's perspective. If you'd like to see something of what Rick is getting up to again, just let me know. **


	10. Chapter 10

**A/N: Sorry for not replying to all of your lovely reviews guys! We've had no Wi-Fi this week, and the day pass I had to buy is about to run out so I've literally only got time to post this. I am eternally grateful though. **

* * *

Her coffee was cold on her desk; the pastry from the box one of the detectives on Karpowski's team had brought in was untouched. Despite the ache beginning to form behind her eyes, Beckett resolutely kept her gaze trained on her computer screen, scrolling every so often to bring up the previous month of appointments in Rachel Winter's electronic diary. She'd already worked her way through the last six months, finding it hard to swallow as she saw her own name as well as Rick's and the location of their first meeting with Rachel. It seemed like so long ago, even though it had only been just under six months. Remembering that meeting, how she had argued and completely overruled their wedding planner only fuelled her desire to solve the case. But so far as she could tell, there were no meetings with Congressman Alan Woods recorded in the scheduling app.

The boys were working just as hard as her. While Ryan trawled his way through months of phone records, entering each number into their system to try and trace one of the calls back to Woods; Esposito was searching past news articles for details of the Congressman's events and then cross-referencing them with her to see if Rachel had attended. By the time lunch rolled around and Castle's call came in, they'd made no more headway than when they'd finished for the day the previous evening.

"Hey, Babe-"

Across the bullpen, Esposito called, "Is that Castle? Tell him he owes me a week with the Ferrari."

On the phone, Rick complained, "How was I supposed to know the _Giants _would lose?" He sighed, breath rattling out of the speaker on Kate's phone. "So how's the case going?"

"Not well," Kate admitted, gathering her things since it was an acceptable time for her to take her lunch break. Getting out of the precinct for a bit would be good for her, and for the migraine she could feel developing. "So far we haven't been able to find any evidence to support Jamie Alanson's claim that Rachel was seeing Alan Woods-"

"Wait, that's who the guy is? _Congressman _Alan Woods? As in hotshot politician, won the election by a landslide despite being only twenty seven because he seemed perfect?"

"Apparently. Obviously since Woods has got a wife, this supposed relationship with Rachel was kept on the downlow. I've been looking through Rachel's appointments all morning and I still haven't found any mention of him."

"How far back have you gone?"

"I've just finished looking through 2013-"

"-Try looking at 2012," Rick instructed.

"Castle, I just got in the lift so I can go on my lunch break-"

"Just trust me?" he asked, equal request and plea.

Sighing, Kate thumbed the button to take her back up to Homicide. "Okay, I'm on my way back up." As she stepped off the elevator, she ignored the questioning looks from her colleagues who'd seen her leave the bullpen just minutes earlier and instead sank back down into her chair. "What exactly am I looking for?"

"Try June 2012." He waited patiently while she scrolled to the appropriate month and began reading out ever entry Rachel – or Henry – had made in the diary.

"Meeting with Harris Whitfield, Appointment at the doctors, Meeting with Anne Michaels-"

"-There, that one. Anne Michaels," Rick exclaimed, cutting her off. "Anne Michaels is now better known as-"

"Anne Woods, the Congressman's wife," Beckett said, speaking the words at the same time as her husband. Even when they were in different states, they could still read each other's minds. "Rick, you're a genius."

Even though she couldn't see the gesture, he shrugged. "Paula told me when she hired Rachel that she'd planned high profile events, even a Congressman's wedding. I remember reading Woods' engagement announcement in the paper because it was the morning after…Alexis' graduation and well, I've stockpiled a lot of details about that morning in my memory. I just wondered if he was the Congressman."

"Babe," Kate replied almost elatedly as soon as he had finished speaking. "I'm going to have to hang up on you. I need to put a call through to the planning company, get all their records on Alan Woods. They might have helped plan some of his campaign parties or have more records of how often Rachel met with Alan and Anne-"

"-Say no more. Call me back this evening and tell me how it's going?"

"You got it," She promised.

Although they hadn't heard the whole conversation, the boys could tell from Kate's body language that she'd got something. The small smile gracing her lips was sign enough, but she was positively buzzing as she took her desk phone from the cradle and dialled the number she had got to know off by heart through the duration of investigating Rachel's case.

* * *

Still smiling at the excitement in Kate's voice as she had ended their call, Rick pushed his phone back into the pocket of his jeans and stretched his arms out along the bench he was enjoying the view of Meridian Hill Park, expecting Paula to call any minute and remind him it was only an hour until his second signing of the day. He'd only been in Washington DC since the previous evening, but he couldn't stop thinking of how ironic it was that he was there. Under different circumstances he could have ended up living in the city.

He was so engrossed in the view, however, that he almost missed the soccer ball flying in the direction of his head.

"Ball!" It was a delayed shout from a young boy sprinting towards him, but Rick still dug his feet into the ground and stood before walking around the back of the bench to rescue the boy's ball before it could bounce and roll into the water staircase.

"Here you go," he said, handing the ball over just as an older girl jogged over and stopped in front of him beside the child who was obviously her younger brother.

"What do you say to the nice man, Nate?"

"Thank you," Nate replied quickly, the two words blurted before he dashed away kicking the round ball in front of him with every step.

Rick's mouth had already opened, the words, "Glad I could help," dying on his lips as he watched Nate's retreating figure.

"Sorry, he's shy," his sister explained before smiling uncertainly and heading after her brother. Her polite tone, the way she acted so responsibly, well it reminded him a lot of Alexis and he found that even though there were other people wandering about the park – couples strolling around holding hands, parents helping young kids to feed the birds bread – his attention was repeatedly drawn back to Nate and his sister as he wondered what it would have been like if he'd been able to give Alexis a sibling or two. When his phone rang and he answered Paula's call, hopping up off the bench once more to cross the park, he waved at the two kids still playing soccer even though it was getting almost too cold and none of the other families had bothered to bring a ball or a game.

* * *

Evidence in hand, Beckett accompanied Ryan and Esposito to Gates' office, knocking clearly three times and waiting for the command to enter before opening the door and leading the way, on point as always.

"Detectives?"

"We have the evidence, Sir."

"Go on," Gates requested, removing her glasses and holding them in one hand as she surveyed Beckett.

"Rachel Winters planned the Woods' wedding – that was how they initially met, but there were plenty of subsequent meetings both before and after the wedding-"

"-_After _the wedding?" Gates interrupted, seeking clarification.

"Yes, Sir," Esposito replied, picking up the story. "The planning business that our vic worked for, _Six Degrees of Celebration, _was involved in the organising of a number of events during Woods' congressional campaign, each of which Rachel Winters was on the list of attendees, even though it was another of her colleagues who arranged parties."

"And that's all you've got?"

"Not quite. I was looking into Rachel's phone records. After checking each phone number, I was only left with four unregistered cell phones, but by focusing on the dates Beckett was able to provide me with from Rachel's schedule, I found she was only making and receiving calls from one of the unregistered numbers, and each one took place before or after one of the meetings. The same phone number continues to appear in the printout after the Woods' wedding but not before."

"And what about a connection with the Cleavers?"

"They were also on the guest list for a number of Woods' events and were contributors to his campaign funds," Kate answered.

"_And _Woods has a permit for a Wesson and Smith 625, the-"

"-Type of gun our guy used in the Cleaver murders," Gates interrupted, nodding as she finished Esposito's sentence. "Unfortunately, detectives, so far this is all circumstantial-"

"-But enough for a search warrant, right, Sir?" Ryan asked hopefully.

The three of them waited with bated breath as Gates gave them a dubious look before picking up the phone on her desk and dialling. It wasn't that she doubted the evidence her three detectives had collected; Gates just knew that unless there was watertight evidence that a United States Congressman could have been involved in a murder, judges would be loath to grant a warrant of any kind.

* * *

Standing front and centre, Esposito knocked, their warrant from Judge Markway folded securely in his other fist. Behind him, Beckett and Ryan were already pulling latex gloves on while the few uniforms they had brought to help search the large property disembarked from their van. His badge hung proudly around his neck, in full view when Congressman Woods opened his front door and paused, his hand still on the open door and his arm barring entry.

"Detective Esposito, NYPD." Nodding his head to the left, Espo introduced Beckett and then Ryan. "We have a warrant to search your property, offices and car, Sir," Javi said, unfurling the warrant in case Woods doubted them.

"Hang on, what's this all about?"

"Sir, if you let us in, we can explain somewhere more private," Beckett tried, knowing that on a street like the Nassau County one Congressman lived on, the neighbours could be peering through their curtains and coming out of their houses any second.

It looked for a moment like Woods was going to argue, but the voice of his wife calling, "Alan, who is it?" seemed to remind him that none of them were interested in causing a scene. It looked bad enough for the congressman having the police search his home – he didn't need the bad press that would come if one of his neighbours called a journalist and the story of him arguing out on the street with the NYPD got out. As Alan Woods stepped aside, she followed Javi into his home.

While Beckett and Ryan seated Congressman Woods and his wife on a couch, Esposito began coordinating with uniforms. They had reports of what they were looking for – a knife with bloodstain residue and a Smith and Wesson 625 gun – one that their suspect had a licence for. It seemed that Alan Woods was a bit of a collector. In one of his glass-fronted cabinets, he had a whole series of handguns and rifles, many of which Espo knew were used in the US Military. It was almost laughable that the gun they were looking for was still in the case alongside the others. Most criminals would dispose of their murder weapon. Signalling to the closest uniform, Esposito indicated the weapon and left the team to bag the evidence, instead rifling carefully through the drawers of the dining room sideboard for 45 calibre bullets. Once he had them, recovered from a storage unit in the bedroom, he returned to the living room where his colleagues were still sat with Alan and Anne Woods.

"Beckett," he said, holding up the two evidence bags that contained the gun and bullets.

Mouth set in a grim line, Kate stood and pulled a set of handcuffs from under the hem of her shirt. "Mr Woods, if you could please stand up."

"What's going on?" Anne asked in horror as her husband reluctantly did as Kate requested.

"Alan Woods, you are under arrest for the murders of Rachel Winters, James Cleaver and Monica Cleaver." She tightened the handcuffs around the Congressman's wrists, let him hear the click as they locked before she continued and read him his Miranda rights. "You have the right to remain silent, anything you say can and will be used against you in a court of law. You have the right to an attorney. If you cannot afford an attorney, one will be provided for you. Do you understand the rights I have just read to you?"

* * *

Sitting across from Alan Woods, Kate locked her fingers together and stared him down. "Tell us about Rachel, Alan."

After sharing a glance with his attorney, Alan said earnestly, "I don't know what you expect me to say. She was my wedding planner. I barely knew her."

"Don't play games with me, Alan. We know you were having an affair."

She watched, seeing how the young politician's jaw ticked and he looked away for a moment before meeting her eyes again, any pretence of ignorance that he had held when she and Esposito had first entered the room was now gone. "Fine. We were seeing each other."

"How did that start?" It wasn't exactly a necessary question but the only way she could see they were going to get any kind of confession was by getting the whole story from Woods. And she couldn't help being curious.

Alan shifted uncomfortably in his chair before he answered. "I tried, but we just clicked. At first it was all business, but the more we saw each other, the harder it got. We went to the same high school, you know. I saw her at the reunion, it was the first time we'd seen each other since the wedding."

"So why'd you kill her?"

Before Woods could speak, his attorney laid a hand on his arm. "Don't answer that. Detective Beckett and her colleagues don't have any actual evidence that you committed this murder."

"How did you wife feel about this fling you had with Rachel? Because that's what it was, right? A fling? Or did Rachel want something more?" She leaned forwards, trying to pile the pressure on Woods, and when he refused to answer her questions she changed tact. "What about Monica and James Cleaver? They contributed to your election campaign, very generously," she added, looking down at her paperwork to check the sum before saying, "A quarter of a million dollars in fact." The next question she planned to ask was interrupted by Ryan's knock on the interrogation room door.

"Beckett?" he asked, just poking his head in through the tiny gap he'd opened the door.

* * *

She continued to watch Woods in the observation room as Esposito stared at him, never blinking.

"We got ballistics back on the gun. It didn't fire the slugs Lanie pulled from James and Monica Cleaver's bodies. The gun's never been fired."

"What?" Beckett demanded. "That doesn't make any sense. It's the exact make and model used in the murders!" As if he knew they were there, as if he knew what Beckett had just been told, Woods turned his eyes from the table and stared at the two-way mirror. "How did you do it?" she murmured, knowing without a doubt that they had their killer; just not the evidence to convict him. "Did you check the serial of the gun?"

Ryan nodded. "Same serial number that's on Woods' licence."

"Have the lab check for evidence that it could have been faked. And get the house checked with a fine-toothed comb. The evidence we need is there somewhere."

Leaving the room after Kevin, Beckett took a moment to collect herself before twisting the handle on the interrogation room door and entering. Although he didn't have a clue what was going on, Esposito did not look inquisitively at her while she sat down but maintained his trained scrutiny of Alan Woods, hoping the way he sat with his arms crossed displaying his arm muscles was kept the air of threat in the room.

"We took a gun from your house, Alan. It's at the Crime Lab right now. You're a smart guy, you must know how ballistics work. What do you think they'll find?" she asked, bluffing and pretending that she didn't already know the results of the testing that had taken place on the gun.

"Nothing," he answered with a shrug of his shoulders, "None of my guns have ever been fired. I collect military pieces – things my father used while he was serving."

"What did you do with the Smith and Wesson you used to murder James and Monica Cleaver then?"

"Look, Detective, I know that you don't have anything on me other than the fact that I was in a relationship with one of your victims and two others contributed funds to my campaign, which in itself is no big deal – lots of people made donations. I know my rights. If you don't have sufficient evidence to charge me, you have to let me go."

"I don't have to do anything," Beckett practically spat. "I may not have anything concrete on you yet, Woods, but you can bet your last paycheck I will soon. In the meantime, let's make you comfortable in lockup." As soon as Alan Woods stood up, she slapped handcuffs back onto his wrists and marched him out of interrogation and down to the cells, his attorney protesting every step of the way. All the way back up the to the bullpen, Woods' lawyer complained and unfortunately for her, Gates overheard as she strode past her open office door.

"Beckett! In my office now!"

Exhaling loudly, frustration coursing through her system, Kate shut Gates' office door harder than she probably should have, but from the Captain's tone it was obvious she was about to be shouted at.

"Did I just hear correctly? You don't have sufficient evidence to charge Alan Woods so you're holding him in lockup?"

"I could have got a confession from him but he lawyered up, of course," Kate pointed out, absolutely certain that Alan Woods was guilty.

"He's a member of Congress! The media are going to be all over this."

"So we should treat him differently? Just because he's a politician doesn't mean he's above the law."

Gates surveyed her for a minute, giving her an odd look that Kate couldn't interpret before she asked, "Are you sure you're not compromised by this case, Beckett?" She knew in the back of her mind that she was probably pushing this case harder than she usually would, that if the suspect was just the usual Joe, she would be able to see the benefits of granting him release and then following him and compiling evidence that way. But this case was too close to home in more ways than one. She _knew _Rachel, and if this case turned into her mother's – one where she couldn't bring the killer to justice because of his position – she would lose all her faith in the job and in the political system.

* * *

**A/N: Thank you so much for reading. Those of you wondering what's going on with Madeline, rest assured she will be back soon. I hope you liked this chapter. Let me know what you thought!**


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